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Translation Multiples

From Global Culture to Postcommunist Democracy

Kasia Szymanska

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Paperback

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English
Princeton University Press
03 September 2025
A new genre of writing demonstrating that translation is neither a transparent medium nor a secondary form of literature

In Translation Multiples, Kasia Szymanska examines what happens when translators, poets, and artists expose the act of translation by placing parallel translation variants next to one another in a standalone work of art, presenting each as a legitimate version of the original. Analyzing such ""translation multiples"" as a new genre of writing, Szymanska explores how an original text can diverge into variants, how such multiplicity can be displayed and embraced, and how the resulting work can still be read as a coherent text. To do so, she focuses on contemporary projects in two different contexts-Anglophone experimental practices and post1989 Poland's emergence into democracy-while viewing them against the backdrop of twentieth-century cultural and political developments.

Szymanska first takes a broad look at Anglophone global culture, debunking the myth of translation as a transparent medium and an unoriginal, secondary form of writing. She then turns to postcommunist Poland, where projects introducing multiple translation variants with different ideological readings offered an essential platform for pluralist political discussion. She examines in particular an elaborate metatranslation of ""La Marseillaise""; a triple rendering of Anthony Burgess's novel A Clockwork Orange; and a quadruple book of Bertolt Brecht's poetry with distinct readings by four translators. She argues that the creators of such multiples want to tell their own stories-personal, critical, visual, or political. Showing why multiple translations matter, Szymanska calls for a redefined practice of reading translations that follows the ethics of the multiple.
By:  
Imprint:   Princeton University Press
Country of Publication:   United States
Dimensions:   Height: 235mm,  Width: 156mm, 
ISBN:   9780691265490
ISBN 10:   0691265496
Pages:   248
Publication Date:  
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  General/trade ,  Primary ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active

Kasia Szymanska is lecturer in the Centre for Translation and Intercultural Studies at the University of Manchester.

Reviews for Translation Multiples: From Global Culture to Postcommunist Democracy

""[A] celebratory, pluralist approach to translation.""---Jess Jensen Mitchell, Hopscotch Translation 


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