Minor Exchanges: Romanian Anthologies of Translated Japanese Poetry published during the Last Decades of the Communist Regime
Minor Exchanges: Romanian Anthologies of Translated Japanese Poetry published during the Last Decades of the Communist Regime

Summary/Abstract: This paper analyses the translation of Japanese poetry published in Romania during the last decades of the communist regime in the form of anthologies. To this end, I will look, on the one hand, at relevant examples of literary translations, and on the other hand, at complementary sources such as translators’ forewords& after words and other materials outlining the contemporaneous theoretical discourse about the methods and aims of poetry translation. My analysis will discuss the mutual influence between theories and practices of translation emerging under the communist regime, with a focus on the period following the “cultural thaw” of the late 1960s. I will specifically concentrate on the tendencies, commonly equated with a return to the ideologically-driven socialist realism, that started after Ceaușescu’s visit to China, North Korea, North Vietnam, and Mongolia in 1971. My intention is to shed light on how translations of poetry from Japanese into Romanian—two non-Western, “minor” languages—intersected with politics, especially with socialist state ideologies and (self-)censorship mechanisms. Special attention will be paid to the fact that translations of Japanese poetry were often indirect, usually drawing from a multitude of diverse texts from French, English, Italian, and German anthologies, re-compiled by the Romanian translators.

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