Quantitative translationscapes and chronological constellations: French, Soviet, and American novels in communist Romania
Quantitative translationscapes and chronological constellations: French, Soviet, and American novels in communist Romania

Summary/Abstract: This article makes use of quantitative methods to chart the particular morphologies of translated novels in Romania after World War II. The three charts presented show the chronological shift in the preferences for translating novels in a comprehensive account of all the Russian (and Soviet), French, and American novels translated in Romania, demonstrating that the translations can be analyzed through what Jordan A.Y. Smith convincingly argues to be a useful model in translation studies and world literature, namely translationscapes. Through use of an extensive database, the article illustrates which periods the novels translated in communist Romania originate from and describes three patterns of translation during communism according to David Damrosch’s approach to canon. This points towards a certain need for clarifying the circulation of the novel from a big data perspective, through what this study refers to as quantitative translationscapes.

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