Bridges to our knowledge

A way from seminars and conferences can we remember when was the last time we participated in an informal discussion about the role of a translator? We often exchange thoughts and ideas with friends, colleagues and acquaintances after coming in close proximity with some of the best literature of the world. We say that we’ve read “Crime and Punishment” instead of saying “Prestupléniye i nakazániye” or “One Hundred Years of Solitude” instead of saying “Cien años de soledad”.

- SOUMALYA CHATTERJEE

While uttering these translated titles of the books we forget we’ve actually read them as translations and this unconscious indifference towards the role of a translator causes many problems. We never pay attention to acknowledge the hardship of the translator and we restrict ourselves from learning new languages because our unconscious notion allows us to believe we have savored the books in their original languages. Perhaps because of this negligence we’ve failed to give the space and comfort which our Indian translators deserve.

Translation has always been an important literary tool. Translators from different time periods have pulled out a literary piece from the cluster of a particular vernacular and delivered it to another language and culture. In a sense, translation makes a book international. The interesting fact is that we are used to reading literature in translation from our early childhood but we fail to distinguish the difference between the original and the translation.

During childhood we come in contact with books such as “Aesop’s fables'', “Jataka tales'', “Panchatantra'', “The Arabian Nights'' and we literally devoured these books without knowing that we were actually reading world literature through translation. Personally I’ve read the “Jataka tales” which was translated by Sunil Gangopadhyay and I had no idea that I would fall in love with Sunil Gangpadhyay’s poetry in my late teens.