JOSÉ ENDOENÇA MARTINS
Abstract
This article deals with literary translation from English to Brazilian Portuguese, comparing Walker’s (1973/1998) Everyday Use and Uso Diário. The hypothesis that a tradition becomes a translation through migration is dealt with from the perspective of race and translation. From a racial perspective, it involves Du Bois’s (1986) double consciousness, West’s triple association and Martins’s (2003) negriceness, negritude and negriticeness; from a translational view, it includes Derrida’s (1985) double bind, Venuti’s (1998) domestication and foreignization and Martins’s (2010) paralatio, similatio and translatio. The article affirms the three female black characters’ embodiment of both racial and translational features. Dee depicts negriceness and paralatio aspects, Maggie presents negritude and similatio features, and Mrs. Johnson portrays negriticeness and translatio configurations.
Key Words: translation, double consciousness, double bind, tradition.
In this paper, I bring race and translation together, comparing Walker’s Everyday Use with Uso Diário, its translation into Brazilian Portuguese. The idea behind the article is that tradition becomes translation through migration. Two aspects are relevant, racial double consciousness and translational double bind, each of them with three elements: the first with its negriceness, negritude and negriticeness; the second with its paralatio, similatio and translatio.
Negriceness stands for Dee’s double consciousness. It is defined as a black person’s wish to live outside his/her black culture. Dee leaves the Johnson’s rural life and goes to live in Augusta, embracing a tradition that is not hers. One may say that Dee asks Du Bois’s (1986) question “what, after all, am I? Am I an American?” (DU BOIS, 1986: 821), and answers it with West’s (1994) idea of “a deferential disposition toward the Western parent” (WEST, 1993: 85). Dee’s negriceness includes physical, emotional and intellectual qualities: light skin, nice hair, fair body, intellectual sagacity and family hate. She enjoys nice things, but despises the family’s old house.
Paralatio reflects Dee’s double bind. It derives from Schleiermacher’s (1992) studies on translation, “seeks to overcome the irrationality of languages” by dealing “with the elements of both languages” and gets its effect “by increasing or decreasing them” (SCHLEIERMACHER, 1992: 40). From Venuti’s (1998) point of view, a paralatic translation “domesticates foreign texts,” bringing to them “linguistic and cultural values that are intelligible to specific domestic constituencies,” applying “a translation strategy that rewrites the foreign texts in domestic dialects and discourses”, and transforming domestication into “a choice of certain domestic values to the exclusion of others” (VENUTI, 1998: 67).
Five examples of double consciousness and double bind are discussed below, focusing on Dee’s identities, negriceness and paralatio.
DEE NEGRICENESS AND PARALATIO IN ENGLISH AND PORTUGUESE
1. NEGRICENESS:
PARALATIO:
2.NEGRICENESS:
PARALATIO:
3.NEGRICENESS:
PARALATIO:
4.NEGRICENESS:
PARALATIO:
5.NEGRICENESS:
PARALATIO:
Dee is lighter than Maggie, with nicer hair and a fuller figure (p. 49).
Dee é mais clara que Maggie. Tem o cabelo mais bonito e o corpo mais cheio (p. 54).
Dee wanted nice things (…) At sixteen she had a style of her own: and knew what a style was (p.50).
Dee queria do bom e do melhor (...) Aos dezesseis anos ela já possuía um próprio; e sabia o que estilo significava (p.50).
Furtive boys in pink shirts hanging about on washday after school. Nervous girls who never laughed. Impressed with her they worship the well-turned phrase, the cute shape, the scalding humor that erupted like bubbles in lye. She read to them (p.51).
Meninos esquivos, de camisa cor-de-rosa, perambulando por ali no dia de lavar roupa, depois da aula. Meninas nervosas que nunca riam. Todos, impressionados com ela, idolatravam sua expressão bem cuidada, a forma elegante, o humor causticante que surgia como bolhas na lixívia. Ela costumava ler para eles (p.56).
“I can use the churn top as a centerpiece for the alcove table,” she said, sliding a plate over the churn, “and I’ll think of something artistic to do with the dasher” (p. 56).
--Posso usar a tampa do latão como centro de mesa no jardim de inverno – prosseguiu, colocando um prato por cima do latão – e vou pensar em alguma forma artística para usar a batedeira (p. 60).
“Mama,” Wangero said sweet as a bird. “Can I have these old quilts?” (…) Maggie can’t appreciate these quilts!” she said. She’d probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use” (…) Maggie would put them on the bed and in five years they’d be in rags” (..) “Hang them,” she said. As if that was the only thing you could do with quilts (p. 56/58)
-- Mamãe – disse Wangero, delicada como um passarinho --, posso ficar com estas colchas velhas? (...) – Maggie não tem condições de dar valor a essas colchas! É bem capaz que ela seja tão retardada a ponto de as deixar no uso diário. (...) -- Maggie iria usá-las na cama, e em cinco anos elas estariam em frangalhos. (...) Eu as penduraria, como quadros. – Como se essa fosse a única coisa que se pudesse fazer com colchas (p. 61/62).
Initially, associated with color, hair and body shape descriptions in sentence (1), Dee’s negriceness is complemented by the nice things she enjoys and the style she has in sentence (2). Example (3) adds other aspects: her spell on friends through physical shape, humor and reading quality. Sentence (4) concentrates on her relationship with the family house. The family objects that she discarded as useless before moving to Augusta acquire a fashionable status when she returns home years later. Now, she looks at them as the fancy things that deserve exhibition in her apartment. The churn top, the dasher, and the quilts would compose the interior and exterior decoration of her place. She insists that these objects would have a better function than the destiny Maggie would probably give them, the daily use. Dee’s new approach to her old black life, house and culture can be summarized by her warning to Maggie and her mother, spoken in anger, before she drives back to Augusta: “you ought to try to make something of yourself, too, Maggie. It’s really a new day for us. But from the way you and Mamma still live you’d never know it” (WALKER, 1973: 59).
Paralatio represents the translator’s decision to make the target language distance itself from the source text. In example (1), source text’s domestication into Brazilian Portuguese results from Barcellos’s decision to replace the comma with a full-stop. The sentence presents the verbal form “tem” in the TT sentence. In sample (2), Barcellos translates the expression “nice things” as “do bom e do melhor”, expands “sixteen” into “dezesseis anos,” and rewrites “was” as “significava.” In sentence (3), paralatic orientation draws parallels between “school” and “aula”, “they” and “todos,” “well-turned” and “bem-cuidada”, “cute” and “elegante,” “erupted” and “surgia,” and, finally, between “she read” and “ela costumava ler”. One case of a sentence intercalated by commas also appears in Barcellos’s translation: “todos, impressionados com ela.”
Example (4) domesticates source text’s dialogue marker (“…”) with the Brazilian common use of a dash (--) to signal a dialogue. Other samples include the verbal form “prosseguiu” to mean “she said,” of “vou pensar” to correspond to “I’ll think” and of “alguma forma artística” to account for “something artistic”. Finally, sample (5) brings expressions like “delicada/sweet”, “passarinho/bird”, “ficar/have”, “não tem condições de dar valor/can’t appreciate”, “é bem capaz que ela seja/she’d probably be” “a ponto de as deixar/to put them to” “iria usá-las/would put them” “eu as penduraria, como quadros/hang them” “se pudesse/you could.” This is evidence of how TT linguistic domestication of ST language is processed by Barcellos.
Barcellos also makes Portuguese sentences bigger than their English counterparts, by adding new words. For example, the two-word sentence “hang them” becomes the much longer version “eu as penduraria, como quadro,” with five words. The part “como quadro”, absent from English, is added to convey the meaning.
Now, Maggie takes a path that differs from Dee’s negriceness and paralatio. Racially, Maggie follows negritude; translationally, she ties herself to similatio. Negritude indicates “the positive aspects” (MARTINS, 2003: 15) of racial experiences. It corresponds to Du Bois’s (1986) question “what, after all, am I? Am I a Negro?” (DUBOIS, 1986: 821) and to West’s (1993) idea that a negro takes “a nostalgic search for the African (West, 1993: 85) parent. Maggie’s life reflects her love for the Johnson’s family house and Black tradition as represented by the quilts. Similatio, or Maggie’s translational identity, derives from Schleiermacher’s (1992) notion of existing imitation between source and target texts. “Imitation – similatio, as well – “submits to the irrationality of the languages” and seeks to keep source text foreignness visible in the target language, giving the domestic text reader “an impression similar to that which the contemporaries of the original received from it” (SCHLEIERMACHER, 1992: 41). From Venuti’s (1998) perspective, a similatic translation affirms “foreignness by challenging domestic canons for foreign literature and domestic stereotypes for foreign cultures” (VENUTI, 1998: 81). In short, a foreignizing translation creates “different values and practices,” which can “change the domestic culture” (VENUTI, 1998: 56/57) and language.
Eight samples exemplify Maggie’s identities, negritude and similatio.
MAGGIE NEGRITUDE AND SIMILATIO IN ENGLISH AND PORTUGUESE
1. NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
2.NEGRITUDE
SIMILATIO:
3.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
4.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
5.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
6.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
7.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO:
8.NEGRITUDE:
SIMILATIO Have you ever seen a lame animal. Perhaps a dog run over (…)? That’s the way my Maggie walks. She has been like this, chin on chest, eyes on ground, feet in shuffle (p.49), ever since the fire that burned the other house to the ground (p.49).
Alguma vez vocês viram um animal manco, talvez um cão atropelado (...)? É assim que minha Maggie anda. Ela ficou assim, com o queijo enfiado no peito, os olhos no chão, arrastando os pés, desde o incêndio que destruiu totalmente a outra casa. (p. 54).
I hear Maggie suck her breath. “Uhnnnh,” is what it sounds like. (p.52).
Percebo que Maggie prendeu a respiração. O som que ela faz é como “uhnnnh” (p.56).
He moves to hug Maggie, but she falls back, right up against the back of my chair. I feel her trembling there and when I look up I see the perspiration falling off her chin (p. 52).
Ele faz menção de abraçar Maggie mas ela recua, escondendo-se por trás da minha cadeira. Sinto que ela treme e quando olho para cima vejo o suor que escorre de seu queixo (p.57).
(Maggie) keeps trying to pull it (hand) back. It looks like Asalamalakim wants to shake hand but wants to do it fancy. Or maybe he don’t know how people shake hands (p.53).
(Maggie) não pára de tentar soltá-la. Parece que Asalamalakim quer lhe dar um aperto de mãos, mas de um jeito diferente. Ou pode ser que ele não saiba como é um aperto de mãos (p.57-58).
“Aunt Dee’s first husband whitted the dash” said Maggie so low you almost couldn’t hear her. “His name was Henry, but they call him Stash” (p.55).
-- Quem fez a batedeira foi o primeiro marido de tia Dee – disse Maggie em voz tão baixa que quase não dava para se ouvir. – O nome dele era Henry, mas todos o chamavam de Stash (p.61).
“She can have them, mama,” she [Maggie] said, like somebody used to never winning anything, or having anything reserved for her. “I can ‘member grandma Dee without the quilts” (p.58).
-- Ela pode ficar com elas, mamãe – disse ela [Maggie], como alguém acostumado a jamais ganhar qualquer coisa, ou jamais ter alguma coisa reservada para si. – Eu posso me lembrar de vovó Dee sem as colchas (p. 62).
It was Grandma Dee and Big Dee who taught her how to quilt herself (…) She looked at her sister with something like fear but she was wasn’t mad at her. This was Maggie’s portion. This was the way she knew God to work (p.58).
Foram vovó Dee e Big Dee que a ensinaram a fazer alcochoados (...) Olhava para a irmã como algo semelhante ao medo, mas não tinha raiva dela. Este era seu quinhão. Era dessa maneira que ela sabia que Deus agia (p.62).
Maggie smiled; maybe at the sunglass. But a real smile, not scared (p.59).
Maggie sorriu; talvez por causa dos óculos. Mas um sorriso de verdade, sem medo (p.63).
In example (1), ugly and physically crippled, Maggie’s flawed body results from the burning of the house, leaving her with body scars. Examples (2, 3, 4) imply Maggie’s rejection of Dee’s lifestyle through her refusal to shake hands with Dee’s boyfriend Asalamalakim. Example (5) deals with Maggie’s knowledge of her family tradition. For example, she knows that it was Henry, Aunt Dee’s first husband, who made the dasher. She even remembers his nickname, Stash. Knowledge of family tradition is complemented by her unselfishness, in example (6). Maggie gives up the quilts and passes them on to Dee. Sample (7) depicts Maggie’s crafting abilities. She learned her expertise in making quilts from Grandma Dee and Big Dee. Maggie’s unselfishness and spirituality are also associated with quilt crafting. Finally, example (8) portrays Maggie’s transformation. This brings to her a sense of self-empowerment and a fearless smile.
In example (1), similatic translation appears in the correspondence between expressions like “lame animal/animal manco” and “eyes on the ground/olhos no chão”. In sentence (2), onomatopoeic sound “uhnnnh” is represented the same way in the two languages. In example (3), linguistic foreignization goes on in the way source expression “but she falls back” is verbally recaptured by the target sentence “mas ela recusa’, without a comma before the conjunction “but”. Additional samples of similatio are present in expressions like “I look up/olho para cima”, “I see the perspiration/vejo o suor”, and “hug Maggie/abraçar Maggie.” In example (4), Barcellos maintains Dee’s boyfriend’s name Asalamalakim unchanged in Portuguese. Sample (5) keeps the proper names “Dee”, “Maggie”, “Henry” and “Stash” unchanged. In sentence (6), the expressions “she said”, “like somebody” and “without the quilts” find their similatic counterparts in “ela disse”, “como alguém”, and “sem as colchas.” In sentence (7), similatio is dealt with through the correspondence between “grandma Dee” with “vovó Dee.” Here, Black English appears in the proper name “Big Dee”, unchanged in Portuguese. In sentences (4 and 6), the samples of Black English “he don’t” and “I can ‘member” are not considered by the translator. Finally, in example (8), proper noun “Maggie” is kept in both source and target texts.
Finally, Mrs. Johnson is the mother who mitigates the opposition between Dee and Maggie. Her in-betweenness is represented by negriticeness, which “mingles the aspects associated with negritude with the configurations attached to negriceness” (MARTINS, 2003: 15). Mediating between Dee’s negriceness and Maggie’s negritude, Mrs. Johnson becomes the translated black woman per se, who “translate[s] and negotiate[s] between” (HALL, 2006: 89) the daughters. Her translatability is connected with Du Bois’s (1986) and West’s (1993) characterization of an identity that contains a back and forth movement between different traditions. Moving between the daughters, she asks with Du Bois, “can I be both” (DU BOIS, 1986: 821), an American and a Negro? And answers with West, suggesting that a racially hybrid black person like herself knows that life “resides in a critical negation, wise preservation and insurgent transformation of this black lineage which protects the earth and projects a better world” (WEST, 1993: 85).
Mrs. Johnson’s negriticeness calls for translatio. Translatio indicates a back and forth movement between paralatio and similatio. In Venuti’s terms, it neither domesticates nor foreignizes the source text. In Kruger’s (2008) words, it is “regarded as hybrid, as complex, polyphonic blends of the domestic and the foreign, of the familiar and the strange, of other-ness and self-ness” (KRUGER, 2008: 174).
The six samples below deal with Mrs. Johnson’s identities, negriticeness and translatio.
MRS. JOHNSON NEGRITICENESS AND TRANSLATIO IN ENGLISH AND PORTUGUESE
1. NEGRITICENESS [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
2.NEGRITICENESS [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
3.NEGRITICENESS [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
4.NEGRITICENESS [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
5.NEGRITICENESS [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO [DEE]
[MAGGIE]
6.NEGRITICENESS
[DEE/MAGGIE]
TRANSLATIO
[DEE/MAGGIE]
Sometimes I dream a dream in which Dee and I are suddenly brought together on a TV Program (p.48).
I will wait for her in the yard that Maggie and I made so clean and wavy yesterday afternoon (p.47).
Às vezes sonho que Dee e eu somos de repente reunidas num programa de televisão (p.53).
Vou esperar por ela no quintal que eu e Maggie deixamos tão limpo e ondulado ontem à tarde (p.52).
She used to read to us without pity (…) burned us with a lot of knowledge … (p.50)
Sometimes Maggie reads to me (…) She knows she is not bright (p.50).
Ela costumava ler para nós sem piedade (...) marcou-nos com o fogo de um conhecimento... (p.54).
De vez em quando Maggie lê para mim (...) Ela sabe que não é brilhante (p.55).
I feel my whole face warming from the heat waves it [Dee’s dress] throws out. (p.52)
I feel her [Maggie] trembling there and when I look up I see the perspiration falling off her chin (p.52).
Sinto meu rosto todo se aquecer com as ondas de calor que o vestido emite (p.57).
Sinto que ela [MAGGIE] treme e quando olho para cima vejo o suor que escorre de seu queixo (p.57).
“Why don’t you take one or two of the others?” I asked. “These old things was just done by me and Big Dee from some tops your grandma pieced before she died” (p.56-57).
“The truth is,” I said, “I promised to give them quilts to Maggie, for when she marries John Thomas” (p.57).
– Por que você não leva um ou dois dos outros? Essas velharias foram feitas por mim e por Big Dee com uns retalhos que sua avó reuniu antes de morrer (p.61).
– O problema é que eu prometi dar essas colchas para Maggie, quando ela se casar com John Thomas (p.61).
“Maggie can’t appreciate these quilts!” she said (p.57).
“She can have them, Mama,” she said (p.58).
– Maggie não tem condições de dar valor a essas colchas! (p.61).
– Ela pode ficar com elas, mamãe – disse ela (p.62).
I did something I never had done before: hugged Maggie to me, then dragged her on into the room, snatched the quilts out of Miss Wangero’s hands and dumped them into Maggie’s lap (p.58).
Fiz o que nunca fizera antes: abracei Maggie apertado, arrastei-a para dentro do quarto, arranquei as colchas das mãos da senhorita Wangero e Joguei-as no colo de Maggie (p.62).
In Sample (1), Mrs. Johnson’s negriticeness connects her with Dee, having the glamour of their appearance on Johnny Carson’s TV show. She enjoys being associated with the American life of TV show. On the other hand, her connection with Maggie refers to the daily routine of cleaning. In sentence (2), Mrs. Johnson praises Dee’s reading skill, but devalues Maggie for lacking reading ability. Sample (3) shows how impressed Mrs. Johnson is with Dee’s fashionable look. The strong colors of her long dress, her hair-style, golden earrings and bracelets make her say “I like it.” As for Maggie, there is concern. Maggie’s discomfort with Dee’s arrival appears in body trembling and perspiration, and her wish to run away. The mother makes her stay, saying “Don’t get up.” Example (4) is the turning point between the three women. The bone of contention is the quilts: Dee wants them, but the mother gives them to Maggie. Sentence (5) focuses on the conflicting relationship between the two sisters, involving the quilts. While educated and sophisticated Dee shows a profoundly biased evaluation of Maggie’s appreciation of the quilts, almost illiterate Maggie behaves unselfishly, offering them to Dee. Finally, sample (6) presents Mrs. Johnson, who rewards Maggie’s unselfishness and appreciation of the family tradition, but punishes Dee, leaving her without the quilts she very much wanted.
Mrs. Johnson’s translatio mediates Dee’s paralatio and Maggie’s similatio. In sentence (1), the mother connects herself with both Dee and Maggie. In her relationship with Dee, the expression “I dream a dream” is translated into the domesticating form “sonho”, eliminating the English redundancy. A similar procedure is applied when the word “together” is translated as “reunidos,” and “TV” as “televisão,” these samples depicting a translation of the paralatic type. However, when related to Maggie, sentence (1) follows a similatic orientation, in which the expression “wait for her” is treated as “esperar por ela,” “in the yard” as “no quintal”, and “yesterday afternoon” as “ontem à tarde.” Sentence (2) begins with Dee’s characterization, with Barcellos transporting the expression “burned us” into Portuguese as “marcou-nos com fogo.” Maggie’s similatio is exemplified by keeping the proper name in both languages, as in the sentences “Maggie reads to me” and “Maggie lê para mim.”
In sample (3), regarding Dee, the term “warming” is translated as “se aquecer”, the pronoun “it” is transferred as the noun “o vestido.” As for Maggie, similatic translation treats the expression “I feel her trembling” as “sinto que ela treme’’ and “when I look up I see the perspiration falling off her chin” as “quando olho para cima vejo o suor que escorre de seu queixo.” Sample (4) informs about how Mrs. Johnson reports on Dee. Domestication is present when Barcellos transfers the ST expression “these old things” as the TT “essas velharias.” Similatically, Barcellos keeps the English proper names “Big Dee”, “Maggie” and “John Thomas” in Portuguese. Example (5) opens with a paralatic treatment, with Barcellos translating the sentence “Maggie can’t appreciate” as “Maggie não tem condições de dar valor.” Finally, in sentence (6), a paralatic translation is realized between the sentences “I never had done before” and “hugged Maggie to me” and their versions “nunca fizera antes” and “abracei Maggie apertado.” Similatic treatment refers to the proper nouns “Maggie” and “Wangero”, kept unchanged in Portuguese.
In short, I conducted the analysis of Walker’s short story, comparing Everyday Use with Uso Diário. I utilized two concepts and their related conceptual sub-categories: double consciousness, ant its negriceness, negritude and negriticeness; double bind with paralatio, similatio, and translatio. My hypothesis was that a tradition becomes a translation through migration. The concepts negriceness, negritude and negriticeness were employed to characterize Dee’s, Maggie’s and Mrs. Johnson’s racial experiences and identities. The terms Paralatio, similatio and translatio were used to depict these women’s translational characteristics.
References
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