Translation of philosophical texts

Si mettono a confronto il volgarizzamento della «Poetica» di Lodovico Castelvetro (Vienna, 1570) e i «Petri Victorii Commentarii in primum librum Arsitotelis De Arte Poetarum», un'opera di riferimento per chi traduceva o commentava il trattato aristotelico nella seconda metà del Cinquecento. Alla «Poetica vulgarizzata e sposta» del filologo modenese, inoltre, si affianca  «Il libro della Poetica tradotto di greco da Alessandro Piccolomini» (Siena, 1572), la prima traduzione eseguita dal senese, il quale di solito ricorreva ai compendi o alle parafrasi nella resa volgare dei trattati filosofici antichi. S'ipotizza, quindi, che la traduzione piccolominiana fosse pensata come una risposta critica e nel contempo costruttiva all'opera del Castelvetro.

[English below]

Le présent article a été inspiré par l’article de Jean-René Ladmiral sur la formation en traduction philosophique. Avant d’entreprendre une polémique avec ce grand traductologue, le texte propose une typologie des traductions spécialisées et il essaye de montrer la place de la traduction philosophique au sein d’une telle typologie. Ensuite nous résumons le projet didactique de Ladmiral, pour passer aux traits spécifiques des textes philosophiques et aux difficultés traductologiques liés. Les exemples présentés comprennent surtout les traductions françaises et polonaises des philosophes allemands et les traductions anglaises et polonaises des philosophes français. Puis nous présentons les arguments contre l’idée de la traduction philosophique comme une traduction fondamentale enseignée aux futurs traducteurs, pour finalement arriver à des réflexions concernant la formation des philosophes, illustrées de quelques exemples supplémentaires.

Abstract

The article was inspired by Jean-René Ladmiral’s text on teaching philosophical translation to future translators. Before discussing Ladmiral’s proposition, we try to draw a typology of specialized translation, which will include philosophical translation as an extreme case. Then, we try to summarize Ladmiral’s idea of translation studies and the place philosophical translation occupies in his project. We discuss the specific features of philosophical writing, both mentioned and unmentioned by the great scholar, and the difficulties which arise from these characteristics. The examples include above all French and Polish translations of German philosophers, as well as English and Polish translations of French philosophers. Then, we present arguments against including philosophical translation in a university program. Finally, there are some possible solutions to the problem with philosophical translation.

Abstract: This essay argues that 1- Third World philosophical apprenticeship involves two opposites; enslavement if associated with imitation or an intelligence exploration that seeks to learn from the other’s achievements for the sake of surpassing or catching up with it. 2- There are deep divergences in the direction of 20th century philosophy between a Franco-German marriage and an Anglo-German one. The former dominated the Arab world due to the congeniality of the European left, the higher costs of studying humanities in Anglophone countries, and the literary leanings of the Arabs. 3- This Continental domination produced harmful results seen in the spread of seven claims promoting "the death of philosophy", abandoning scientific research, and giving up on development. 4- Focusing the funding of Arab students in the west on languages and literatures exacerbated the problem, in that taking a philosophical look at the galaxy of modernization became confined to the lens of “literary criticism.” 5- Hence, Continental Philosophy became an obstacle to modernization in the Arab world and a subject of justifiable mockery by traditional readers matriculated in Arab Islamic scholasticism. 6- After doing justice to many German and French scientists, social-scientists, and orientalists, who follow the research traditions of the enlightenment and modernity, the essay emphasizes that Anglophone specialists in philosophy avoid works in postmodern philosophy because it violates philosophical requirements, e.g., logical coherence, empirical support, and theory construction. 7- Finally, a comprehensive philosophical system exists in the Anglophone philosophies, translated into Arabic, and surpasses Continental ones. In this system, “the Tree of Philosophy” comprises “ten integral branches”. 8- Accordingly, philosophy is defined as a deep reflection on clear, consistent, and verifiable meanings, subject to methodological revision, and seeking beauty and good in the context of interaction with local and global cultures in order to advance social prosperity and justice. 9- Studying the listed translated works of these philosophies can enable Arab readers to explore the “nervous system” of modernization and development.

On tentera de donner un bref aperçu de la réception du travail de Jacques Derrida dans les milieux intellectuels hispanophone et anglophone. La réception du travail de l’auteur dans ces deux contextes relève des caractéristiques particulières qui permettent d’entreprendre une étude comparative mettant au jour la tension entre philosophie et littérature à laquelle s’heurtent les traducteurs des textes derridiens. À partir de cette tension dans les deux contextes de réception, on justifie le besoin d’une poétique du texte philosophique telle qu’elle a été proposée par Henri Meschonnic.

The essay deals with Hegel’s fundamental philosopheme, das Aufheben, and with the suggestion of its new translation into Italian through the lexical family of rilevare. After a survey of the various acceptations of the lexeme in Adelung’s Wörterbuch, the greatest scientific dictionary of the Hegelian era, the essay analyzes the only thematic treatment Hegel dedicated to it (in a short annotation of the first part of Science of Logic). Finally, the new translation of aufheben as rilevare is further argued starting from a comparison with the analogous relever suggested by Derrida and Nancy.

In this paper we try to present Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński as a translator of philosophy. First of all, we try to define philosophical translation as such, placing it rather among scientific writings than literary works. Some norms and criteria determined for example by Polish philosopher Roman Ingarden are then explained. Finally, we present Boy-Żeleński’s work as a translator, its reception in Poland, as well as some critical texts. In the last part his translation of Discourse on Method (being the most “philosophical” and the least “literary” among his translations of French philosophy) is thouroughly analysed, so as to show its strong and weak points.

In the Italian edition of Martin Heidegger’s "Ernst Jünger", which I edited and translated, I proposed several new solutions for what concerns the rendering of Heideggerian language in an Italian equivalent. It has to be said that the volume about Ernst Jünger is a kind of exception among Heidegger’s work, since it contains  many political references and might thus be considered as the most peculiar ‘workshop’ of Heidegger’s ingenious political lexicon. I was working on this edition for more than two years.

[1. Abstract] Unlike his later works, Yamaga Sokō's Shidō was the very first attempt in Japanese intellectual history to comprehensively address the identity crisis of the samurai during the pax Tokugawa. As such, its importance is manifold – for one, it was one of the first attempts to transform the Confucian ideal of the noble man (君⼦) into a relevant and compelling moral philosophy, attuned to the complex realities of Tokugawa Japan, moving away from the previous, more scholastic attempts at Confucian interpretation. As such, it is not only offering us a view into the way Confucianism had naturalized during the Tokugawa period and had expanded to a broader audience than ever before, but it also hints at many of the social and political changes happening in 17 th century Japan. In the introductory study, I have detailed Yamaga Sokō's importance in Japanese intellectual history, including the reasons for his temporary demise and his rehabilitation by Yoshida Shōin, as well as his relevance today.

A “giuntina” edition of «Perì hermenèias» (Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, Stamp. 15826), belonging to Benedetto Varchi (1503-1565) and by him richly annotated, testifies on his study on Logica. During his stay in Padua (1537-1541), while giving lectures on Philosophy at the «Studium» and taking part to the Accademia degli Infiammati, the Florentine scholar prepared the ground for building a vernacular philosophic prose by translating and commenting Aristotle's work. When he was called back to Florence in 1543 with the assignment of writing the «Storia fiorentina», Varchi persevered in his efforts to realize the project of putting the philosophic and scientific doctrine into vernacular, by giving lectures on Dante and Petrarch at the Accademia Fiorentina. Such project, moreover, matched with the aim of Duke Cosimo I to make Florentine language an efficient tool of his cultural policy. ***************************************************************************************
L’edizione giuntina del «Perì hermenèias» (Firenze, Biblioteca Riccardiana, Stamp. 15826), appartenuta a Benedetto Varchi e da lui fittamente postillata, è il testimone dei suoi studi sulla logica. Durante il soggiorno a Padova (1537-1541), fra le lezioni di filosofia nello Studio e l’attività all’Accademia degli Infiammati, il letterato fiorentino, traducendo e commentando l’opera di Aristotele, pose le basi alla costruzione di una prosa filosofica in volgare. Richiamato a Firenze nel 1543 per scrivere la Storia fiorentina, Varchi s’impegnò anche, con le letture dantesche e petrarchesche all’Accademia Fiorentina, a mettere in pratica il progetto di trasferire in volgare la dottrina filosofica e scientifica, un progetto che nei principi s’incontrava con l’aspirazione del duca Cosimo I a fare del fiorentino un mezzo efficace della sua politica culturale.

In the first part I analyze the methodology chosen by the authors of French and Polish philosophical dictionaries and the construction of glossaries prepared by translators of philosophical texts. In the second part I confront Henri Meschonnic’s poetics of translating with modern terminology. Derridean terminology and its translations into Polish will be presented on a model of a terminological database, which covers the whole lexical variety of each term.

Nelle indagini di storia della lingua italiana del Cinquecento si osserva che lo storico processo del lento ma deciso affermarsi di un modello linguistico unitario s’intreccia con il volgarizzamento e la riscrittura della letteratura antica di ogni ramo dello scibile. Questo ‘acclimatamento’ in volgare delle materie, che vanno dalla filosofia naturale a quella morale, dalla poetica alla musica, dalla matematica alle arti meccaniche, avviene non soltanto grazie alla traduzione diretta delle opere greche e latine, ma soprattutto in virtù di un innesto del pensiero filosofico, come di quello scientifico-tecnico, nelle nuove teorie espresse nella trattatistica cinquecentesca. E se nel Duecento il volgare della prosa d’arte traeva modelli di un’elegante finitura formale e retorica dagli esempi mediolatini e classici, l'italiano della scrittura argomentativa nel secolo sedicesimo ricerca e sperimenta forme testuali e moduli linguistici che possano restituire appieno i concetti, «il vero delle cose», delle «auctoritates» in ogni disciplina, di Aristotele «in primis».
In questo intervento mi propongo di illustrare alcune delle questioni scaturite dalle ricerche dedicate alla nuova prosa e alla formazione del lessico sia scientifico (in particolare, della logica) sia tecnico (musicale, drammaturgico), così come al ruolo della cultura accademica nel volgarizzamento del sapere nel Cinquecento.

Benedetto Varchi (Florence, 1503-1565), in his lectures (in Accademia Fiorentina) in the years 1543-1564, dedicated mostly to "Divine Comedy" by Dante, provided basis for development of scientific literature in Italian language. Humanist (man of letters), highly educated (in the universities in Padua and Bologna), created expositions of logic studies in Italian language, translating and giving scientific comments on Aristotle’s ideas. From those studies only some manuscripts concerning systematisation and methodology of lectures in scientific knowledge (“exposition” and “explanation”) were published in the nineteenth century. Varchi designed his lectures on basis of “proper way of cognition and knowledge” – synthetic, analytic and defining – indispensable to conduct reasoning and to define research subject. So, he created prose appropriate to exact and natural science, as well as to lectures for diverse audience. Those texts reflect the methodology used in sequence of reasons, in syntax and in terminology which revealed meanings of phenomena. The analysis of syntax, the text construction and the terminology used, carried out in this article, discover and highlight a quality of lectures by Varchi. Lectures that can be an example of new prose which fully developed in scientific texts of the seventeenth century - mostly because of rich and precise scientific language (coming from Greek and Latin), but also enriched by neologisms, as well as by new stylistic based on short sentences, rarely compound, and by creation of sentences based on nouns.
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Benedetto Varchi, nelle sue lezioni tenute all’Accademia Fiorentina (1543-1564) e in gran parte dedicate al commento della "Commedia" e della poesia di Francesco Petrarca, pone le basi di un lavoro volto a costruire il modello di scrittura scientifica in volgare. Grazie a una solida preparazione filosofica, acquisita nei centri universitari di Padova e Bologna, Varchi imposta in volgare l’esposizione dei principi della logica, attraverso la traduzione e soprattutto il commento dell'opera di Aristotele. Di questo suo impegno rimangono alcuni significativi opuscoli, in parte editi nell’Ottocento, una sorta di precettistica della « sposizione e dichiarazione », in cui il letterato fiorentino traccia il metodo per l'acquisizione e l'ordinamento del sapere. E così Varchi costruisce le sue letture accademiche sui procedimenti, « modi particolari d’apparare e di sapere » — « compostivo », « risolutivo » e « diffinitivo » — indispensabili per la dimostrazione di singoli postulati e per l’esatta « determinazione » della materia trattata, mettendo in campo una prosa scientifica adatta all’esposizione orale dinanzi ad un pubblico variegato, in cui l’organizzazione testuale e le strutture sintattiche debbano aderire allo svolgersi del ragionamento e la terminologia renda il significato dei concetti. Dall'analisi della sintassi, della testualità e del lessico emerge il valore delle lezioni varchiane come l'esempio di una nuova prosa argomentativa, che si affermerà a pieno nella scrittura scientifica secentesca: sia per l'uso del lessico ricco di tecnicismi, adattati dal greco e dal latino ma anche formati ex novo tramite la sostantivizzazione e la rideterminazione semantica (« il ricevente », « l’ambiente », « l’astratto », « il concreto », « il difuori »), sia per lo stile spezzettato, l'attenuazione della tensione ipotattica e l'affermarsi delle strutture imperniate sul nome a scapito della centralità del verbo.

Comunicação apresentada no XVII Encontro ANPOF, 2016. Discuto o conceito de matéria primeira desenvolvido por João Filopono de Alexandria em "Sobre a eternidade do mundo contra Próclo", livro XI, e as condições históricas da sua transmissão até o século XVI,  na edição do texto grego e nas traduções para o latim, que podiam ser acessadas pelos filósofos do fim do Renascimento e do Início da Idade Moderna.

با گسترش توجه و علاقه ايرانيان به شناخت انديشه هاي فلسفي و ديني پس از انقلاب و ظهور ترجمه هاي بسيار از كتاب هاي مهم غربي كه در اين زمينه به رشته تحرير در آمده است، اين ترجمه ها و مفاد آنها با چالش هاي جدي روبرو هستند كه اگر به اين چالش ها توجه نشود ما را هم با بدفهمي انديشه غربي و هم با آثار فرهنگي نامتناسب آن مواجه مي سازد. در اين مقاله در نظر است تا برخي آسيب هاي ترجمه متون فلسفي و ديني معرفي شود و ضرورت توجه به مباني هرمنوتيكي اين ترجمه ها مورد توجه قرار گيرد تا بتوان تفسيري مناسب از ديدگاههاي ترجمه شده داشت.

This paper aims at analyzing the translatological choices that have been overlapping each other in the course of the editorial fortune of Foucault’s works first in the Soviet Union and then in Russia. Our choice fell on some particularly significant concepts that recur throughout the philosopher’s work - not limited to the scope of specifically medical discourse -, i.e. key terms starting from which Foucault structures his reflection. As regards the existence of an overall Foucaultian medical discourse, it must be pointed out that it is a reconstruction a posteriori, that covers all the works that can broadly be related to this subject and takes into account, rather than their traditional periodization as proposed by commentators, the claims made by Foucault himself, who has always insisted on the unity and complementary nature of his work. The attempt to undertake a similar analysis leads to a twofold fundamental problem. In fact, on the one hand, the terminology used by Foucault hides a multiplicity of meanings and possible interpretations ab origine, in addition to the complexity of his expositive style and the constant renewal of a philosophical reflection that the philosopher himself conceives as never completely finished. In this regard, it may be noted that Foucault revisits the topic of insanity both at the beginning of his career (in the 1950s), in the 1960’s (in his masterpiece Madness and Civilization) and again in the late 1970s, during the courses held at the Collège de France. A second problematic issue rises on a linguistic level, concerning the rendering in a foreign language of Foucaultian key concepts. In this sense the story of Russian translations of the philosopher’s work represents a case in point. The first translator of Foucault’s major works in the Soviet Union, Natalija Avtomonova, already in the 1970s began to highlight the difficulties encountered by the translator in approaching the dense network of meanings enclosed in Foucault’s text. An example could be the rendering of the term discours (discourse), which in Russian is split into diskurs and diskursija. This choice is based on the acuteness of Avtomonova, who after realizing the complexity and multiplicity of meanings with which the term occurred, tried to convey this gap by introducing a neologism, such as diskursija. It is not, however, the only term raising problems on a translatological plan. In particular, the French term dispositif, translated into Italian as dispositivo (device), is one of the essential cores of Foucault’s entire philosophical thought. It suffers a fate similar to that of discours, from time to time having been translated as dispozitiv (a borrowing from the French), or as apparat or ustrojstvo. All three translations bring with them their own issues, due to an often interpretive intervention operated by the translator. Furthermore, it must be noted that if Foucault’s language, in Italian translation, has achieved an effective terminological stability during the years, the same cannot be said of Russian translations. The Russian case, therefore, appears to be particularly significant and leads us to question the role of philosophical translation and the translator’s responsibility, a topic certainly too wide to be discussed herein. Beyond the merely linguistic issues, its significance consists in its allowing us to draw attention to the difficulties of an essentially conceptual, rather than terminological, rendering. These difficulties, though, are precisely what constituted the core of Foucault’s insight when, focusing on the analysis of the layers of meaning, he distinguished between first and secondary languages.

В статье анализируются сильные и слабые стороны знаменитого словаря философских непереводимостей п/р Б.Кассен и, прежде всего, его русского раздела.
The author discusses critically the conception of the famous Dictionnary of philosophical "Untranslatabilities" ed. by B.Cassin and, in the first place, the Russian section of it.

In the course of the cultural and social turn the problem of the translation unit has been widely marginalized by the attention towards other problems. However, the increasing interest of different disciplines in translation processes occurring in the context of academia and philosophy presses translation studies to (re)consider this issue giving rise to the following questions: What are the crucial translation units which trigger the transformation of a thought collective or the transfer of a thought style (Fleck)? What is the relationship between translation processes on the micro-level of the scientific text and the "transfer" of philosophical thought or the transformations within knowledge cultures? In order to understand the actual contribution of translators to the production of science, it is not enough to acknowledge that certain texts have been translated or not, and by whom. To gain insight into the agency of translators in academic discourse, it is indispensable that we look for their actual philosophical or scientific creativity. With this in mind, the article will focus on the most dense part of philosophical works with regard to technical terminology, namely the glossary. There, micro-structural translation units are concentrated and veritably "put on display". The aim is to show how this site of terminological meticulousness opens up for the translator a sphere of influence and creativity in the sense of knowledge production.

There are obvious problems with the idea of translating nonsense or, for that matter, with paraphrasing it.  Whatever may be the case with literary nonsense, they have been largely ignored with respect to (supposed) philosophical nonsense.  This paper looks at how they arise with Wittgenstein’s Tractatus.  On the traditional ‘ineffability’ reading they are not entirely unfamiliar since similar problems arise with the translation of mystical works.  But those arising from the so-called ‘resolute reading’ may well be unprecedented.

En este trabajo abordamos el estudio de la traducción del texto filosófico, marcado por un carácter profundamente ideológico y por una naturaleza y una función que sitúan su traducción a caballo entre la traducción literaria y la traducción científico-técnica. Nuestro objetivo en este contexto es el de acceder a un conocimiento claro y comprehensivo de la importancia histórico-cultural de la traducción de esta clase discursiva, de su definición, de su tipología y de sus dificultades traductológicas, con especial referencia a la problemática que plantea la cuestión terminológica por el hecho de compartir características del lenguaje literario y del lenguaje científico-técnico.

In this paper we study the translation of philosophical texts. These texts are marked by their deeply ideological character and a nature and function that place their cross-lingual transfer between the literary and the scientific translation. Our objective in this context is to obtain a clear and comprehensive understanding of the historical and cultural importance of the translation of this discursive class, of its definition, its typology and its translational difficulties, with special reference to the problems posed by terminology, due to the fact that this kind of texts combine features of literary and scientific languages.

The article constitutes an attempt to present some of the oldest translations of philosophy into Polish using the methodology suggested by Lieven D’hulst, based on the seemingly simple model: Quis? Quid? Ubi? Quibus auxiliis? Cur? Quomodo? Quando? Cui bono? (Who? What? Where? With whose help? Why? How? When? For whose sake?). In the introduction, the author presents the state of historical research, primarily that in French, and attempts to contextualise in it the study of philosophical translation, understood as non-literary translation. The most important works in historical translation studies are quoted – for example, The History of Translations into French (Histoire des traductions en langue française) – and proposals for Translator Studies are propounded. The latter are compared to the methodology proffered by D’hulst. Next, six works are presented: the first translations of Aristotle and Cicero into Polish. All works discussed date back to the late 16th and early 17th centuries and were published in Łosk (in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania) and Kraków. In accordance with D’hulst’s guidelines, the paper places equal emphasis on such elements of analysis as the translators (Quis?) and other people involved in the publishing of the translated works (Quibus auxiliis?), the context in which the translations were created (Ubi? Quando?), and elements of translation strategy (Quomodo?). The latter were studied using the method of comparative analysis of the translators’ strategies, mostly in the context of philosophical terms. Elements of domestication and foreignization as well as the presence of the translator’s paratext were considered. In the summary the author attempts to briefly answer the question of the influence of these texts on Polish readers (Cui bono?).

[en français dessous] [po polsku poniżej]
The book presents an overview of issues surrounding the translation of philosophical texts, in particular based on the Polish translations of Jacques Derrida’s works.
The book opens with a theoretical part which considers the translation of philosophy in light of various typologies and theories developed in translation studies.
Examples
come from many languages, including Ancient Greek, Latin, English, French, German, Spanish, Russian, Polish, even Hungarian and Hebrew. The analytical part is specifically devoted to the Polish translations of Derrida. This section contains a chapter discussing three case studies of the Polish translations of the essay La différance, allowing insight into the range of linguistic problems this philosophical text posed for Polish translators. A further chapter presents the methodology
used in order to systematize Derridean terminology as well as various translations of Derridean wordplay. Finally, the book contains a history of Polish
translations of Jacques Derrida and the strategies assumed by individual translators. In addition, the book includes a glossary of terms.
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L’ouvrage vise à décrire la spécificité de la traduction des textes philosophiques en général, et les problèmes de traduire Jacques Derrida vers le polonais en particulier.
La première partie, théorique, essaie de placer la traduction philosophique dans le cadre des théories et typologies traductologiques. Après le chapitre sur les théories générales, vient celui qui rassemble de nombreux témoignages et analyses des traducteurs
et des critiques de la traduction. Plusieurs paires linguistiques sont commentées et les langues abordées comprennent le grec, le latin, l’anglais, le français,
l’allemand, l’espagnol, le russe, le polonais et même le hongrois et l’hébreu. La deuxième partie concerne les traductions polonaises de Jacques Derrida. Un chapitre
est consacré à une analyse détaillée des trois versions polonaises de l’essai La différance, ce qui permet de montrer les différents problèmes traductologiques et
linguistiques des traducteurs polonais. Ensuite, l’auteure présente sa méthodologie d’analyse terminologique et les différentes méthodes de traduire les jeux de mots
derridiens. Finalement, le dernier chapitre présente l’histoire des traductions de Derrida en Pologne à travers une trentaine des traducteurs qui ont entrepris cette
tâche. À la fin du livre, on trouve un annexe terminologique.
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Książka ma na celu zarysowanie problematyki przekładu tekstów filozoficznych na podstawie polskich przekładów dzieł Jacques’a Derridy. Część pierwsza, teoretyczna, rozpatruje przekład filozoficzny w świetle teorii i typologii przekładoznawczych, a następnie przedstawia szeroki wybór komentarzy i analiz tłumaczy oraz krytyków tłumaczeń filozofii. Przykłady pochodzą z wielu języków, w tym greki, łaciny, angielskiego, francuskiego, niemieckiego, hiszpańskiego, rosyjskiego, polskiego, a nawet węgierskiego i hebrajskiego. Druga część poświęcona jest analizie polskich przekładów tekstów Jacques’a Derridy. Jeden z rozdziałów stanowi mikrostudium trzech polskich przekładów eseju La différance, co pozwala ukazać szeroki wachlarz problemów przekładowych i językowych, z którymi borykali się polscy tłumacze tego filozofa. Następnie przedstawiona jest metodologia terminologiczna oraz sposoby tłumaczenia derridiańskich gier słownych. Na końcu przedstawiona zostaje historia polskich przekładów Jacques’a Derridy oraz strategie poszczególnych tłumaczy. Do książki dołączony został również aneks terminologiczny.

The translation of books on philosophical and sociopolitical domains is professionally set within the boundaries of translation for the publishing world. Although this translating activity plays an important role in the current Spanish publishing industry, it has been barely studied in relation to the professional demands and competences that define the translator’s task. Consequently, this article has two main goals: first, bringing the definition of sociopolitical and philosophical texts up to date from the study of their genre features, and, second, connecting this theoretical reflection to the work setting, in which the translator is asked to develop a whole range of professional competences easily adaptable to the changing publishing world. The diachrony in translation, the translation methods, the publishing formats and the orality in translation are dealt with as being the leading professional demands. Thus the translator needs to meet specific professional competences targeted towards the fulfillment of a wide range of tasks related not only to the cultural and ideological burden of the texts to be translated but also related to the translation context and the participants in the translation process.

Mosso dall’idea di rendere volgare la scienza, Alessandro Piccolomini commentava e trasferiva nella « bella lingua italiana » i trattati antichi. Analizzando i suoi compendi, così come le parafrasi e le traduzioni, allestiti in quarant’anni di attività di studioso e divulgatore, si possono delineare le idee piccolominiane sul volgare, le quali rappresentano uno degli aspetti della cinquecentesca « questione della lingua ». Sono particolarmente accurate e significative le proposte da lui formulate nelle dedicatorie e nelle lettere "Ai lettori" sulle modalità della resa dei concetti scientifici e filosofici. E la riflessione teorica intorno alla traduzione affidata alla sua "Epistola del modo del tradurre", che introduce la versione volgare della "Poetica" del 1572, si configura come un trattato di punta all’interno del dibattito linguistico cinquecentesco. Grazie alla nascita toscana e al soggiorno padovano, studente di filosofia e accademico degli Infiammati, Alessandro Piccolomini sviluppò un’aggiornata e consapevole concezione della lingua come strumento vivo e perfettibile di conoscenza. L’universalità del sapere, quale garanzia del progresso nelle scienze, nelle arti e nelle tecniche, era per lui indissolubilmente legata alla diffusione e alla crescita di una lingua italiana comune, una lingua di cultura accessibile a tutti.*********************************************
Poussé par la volonté de rendre la science accessible, A. Piccolomini commentait et traduisait dans la «belle langue italienne» les traités de l'antiquité. Par l'analyse des résumés, des paraphrases et des traductions réalisés par l'érudit et le vulgarisateur en quarante ans d'activités, on peut définir ses conceptions, qui représentent l'un des aspects de la «question de la langue» au XVIème siècle. Dans ses dédicases et dans ses lettres «Aux lecteurs», il a formulè des propositions, particulièrement prècises et significatives, sur la façon de restituer les concepts philosophiques et scientifiques. Et sa réflexion théorique à propos de la traduction contenue dans l'«Epistola del modo del tradurre», en introduction à la version italienne de la «Poetique» de 1572, se présente comme un traité marquant au sein du débat linguistique de l'époque. Grâce à sa naissance en Toscane et à son séjour padouan, A. Piccolomini élabora une conception moderne et clairvoyante de la langue comme instrument de connaissance vivant et perfectible. L'Universalité du savoir, garantie du progrès de sciences, des arts et des tecniques, était pour lui liée de manière indissoluble à la diffusion et au développement d'une langue italienne commune, d'une langue de culture accessible à tous.

L’article présente quelques éléments de réception de Jacques Derrida en Amérique à partir de la traduction de ses « mots » indécidables, et particulièrement de celle d’entame. Y est mise à l’épreuve l’hypothèse selon laquelle la réception d’un auteur produira, avec le temps, une homogénéité toujours plus grande des traductions et un nombre toujours plus restreint des traducteurs et des maisons d’édition. Il s’agit d’adapter le principe d’Antoine Berman selon lequel « toute première traduction en appelle à des retraductions » (1995, p. 84) parce qu’elle serait imparfaite, trop idéologique et trop soumise aux normes. Dans le cas de la traduction des sciences humaines et sociales, je pose comme hypothèse qu’on traduit toujours une oeuvre une première fois pour ce qui y est énoncé dans le texte ; c’est la popularité croissante d’un auteur qui augmentera, dans les retraductions, l’intérêt qu’on y porte pour son style, sa langue, etc. Si la plupart des traductions successives de Derrida me permettent d’affirmer cette hypothèse, un exemple la contredit, à savoir la retraduction de La voix et le phénomène par Leonard Lawlor. Quoiqu’elle puisse sembler anodine, la non-conformité de la traduction d’entame par rapport aux traductions habituelles (par broach ou breach, telles que proposées en 1976 par Gayatri Spivak dans Of Grammatology), met au jour un courant mineur de la réception de Derrida aux États-Unis, celui de la phénoménologie, qui ne semble pas catégoriser Derrida comme le fait la réception habituelle. Une étude de ces termes dans la traduction vient donc montrer la force que peut encore avoir un courant de pensée comme la phénoménologie, qui traduit, pourrait-on dire, encore Derrida pour ce qu’il apporte (son objet) plutôt que pour qui il est (son sujet).

The aim of this paper is to compare five different translations of Diogenes Laertiusʼ chapter on Antisthenes and his philosophy. To be more specific, we try to draw a comparison among the translations of one original text, accomplished by Kalaš, Okál, Kolář, Hicks and Σκουτερόπουλος. To begin with, some necessary semantic concepts are explained: truth conditions, informativeness of sentences and differences in meaning. We focus on differences concerning the interpretations of Antisthenes ́ life, his philosophy, and his death.

The dissemination of English philosophical literature in Spain during the last quarter of the nineteenth century calls for an in-depth study of some of the works of Herbert Spencer. His most radical views were recognised by an elite group of Spanish intellectuals who translated his works shortly after the original publication in order to introduce these ideas into the Spanish context. Accordingly, this paper examines the translation of 'Fundamentos de la moral' (1881) rendered by Siro García del Mazo from Spencer's 'The Data of Ethics' (1879) so as to provide-from a descriptive point of view-a thorough critical revision and analysis of a representative philosophical work from the late nineteenth century.

Si tratta della prima edizione completa delle lettere manoscritte, conservate nella Biblioteca Riccardiana di Firenze (Ricc. 2438bis III), che l'accademico e fonetista fiorentino Giorgio Bartoli scrisse fra il 1568 e 1583 all'amico Lorenzo Giacomini (1552, Ancona - 1598, Firenze). L'epistolario ha un primo ed evidente interesse nel documentare l'impiego di una grafia parzialmente ortofonica da parte di uno di più innovativi studiosi cinquecenteschi della fonetica, l'autore del trattato «Degli elementi del parlar toscano» (1584) e continuatore del pensiero linguistico di Benedetto Varchi. Oltre agli aspetti storico-linguistici che propone all'attenzione, la raccolta epistolare consente di mettere in luce la formazione e la personalità di Giorgio Bartoli e i termini del suo sodalizio con un altro letterato ben rappresentativo dell'ambiente accademico fiorentino del secondo Cinquecento, quale fu Lorenzo Giacomini. In «Appendice» si pubblicano altri testi autografi, in gran parte inediti, di Giorgio Bartoli, fra cui la sua lettera «sul tradurre» a Marino Bobali del 1576ca. E oltre all'«Introduzione», che illustra l'ambiente letterario dell'epoca, il volume contiene altri capitoli: gli «Appunti linguistici» che mettono a fuoco l'uso del volgare fiorentino («argenteo»), e i «Personaggi dell'epistolario», contenenti notizie sugli uomini di lettere, sui mercanti e sui politici che si affacciano nelle carte dell'epistolario.

Si tratta della prima edizione del volgarizzamento della «Poetica» aristotelica, approntato da Giorgio Bartoli (1534-1583), l’accademico fiorentino e l’autore del trattato di fonetica “Degli elementi del parlar toscano”, edito postumo nel 1584 a cura dell’amico Lorenzo Giacomini. Il testo qui edito è tratto dal codice Ashb. 531 (II, ff. 1r-38r) della Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana di Firenze. Dal confronto della traduzione di Giorgio Bartoli con la versione latina della «Poetica» eseguita da Piero Vettori e con quelle volgari coeve di Ludovico Castelvetro e Alessandro Piccolomini emergono, da un lato, una notevole autonomia del fonetista fiorentino quanto all’adattamento in volgare dei termini specifici greci e, dall’altro, una sua fedele adesione al metodo seguito da Piero Vettori nella resa dell’ordito sintattico dell’opera originale.

SPET (Seminario Permanente de Estudios de Traducción), Lenguas Vivas

Intervención en el Ciclo I  (abril-julio):
“Heterogeneidad, heterodoxias: proyectos alternativos de traducción”  del Seminario Permanente de Estudios de Traducción del Instituto de Enseñanza Superior en Lenguas Vivas.

این مصاحبه ای با روزنامه ایران در حدود 20 سال پیش است که در آن ملاحظات هرمنوتیکی برای ترجمه متون فلسفی و دینی مورد توجه قرار گرفته است و متذکر می شود که برخی از ترجمه های این متون، توجهی به فضای فرهنگی خود اثر در فرهنگ غربی و ترجمه اثر در فرهنگ ایرانی به اندازه لازم نکرده اند و در نتیجه ترجمه ها انعکاس مطالب معیوبی خواهند بود.

The present paper addresses the relevance of interdisciplinarity in translation and explores Translation Studies in its relation to Gender Studies and Philosophy. An analysis of the latest English translation of Le Deuxième Sexe (The Second Sex) by Simone de Beauvoir enables to show how feminist translation seeks to convey the enmeshment of philosophy, feminism and language, and, therefore, how Translation Studies helps to bridge the gap between disciplines.

Esta comunicação procura descrever criticamente o panorama português no que toca à sua cultura de edição e de tradução, ensaiando linhas de orientação para o empreendimento de traduções de carácter filosófico, no contexto das línguas clássicas. A partir de noções como sentido, equivalência ou coerência, ou do problema do uso de instrumenta, esta discussão será exemplificada com a abordagem de certos elementos lexicais (idem e ipse; ὑπέρ; ἐπέκεινα; οἰκεῖος) e com propostas de soluções para estes problemas.

In this article I endeavour to tackle the myth of Derrida’s untranslatability. First,I present the theoretical basis for my research – Henri Meschonnic’s poetics of translation. Then, I try to determine the factors which make translating Derrida’s texts difficult: the polysemy of his most important terms and the “terminological fields,” that is all the terms related to each other. Two examples of these fields support my argument. Finally, I analyse some Polish translations of Derrida’s text and show linguistic difficulties in Polish translations of La différance and other texts, where not only the Derridean style, but also grammar, vocabulary, and expertise in philosophy leave a lot to be desired.

This paper questions the role played by the translation of western philosophical writings in the development of the concept of “intuition” (zhijue 直覺) in contemporary Chinese philosophy. It focuses on the translations and discussions about the concept of intuition in Bergson’s works. Bergson is known to have had a very strong influence on several modern Neo-Confucian thinkers, notably Liang Shuming (An, 1997). However instead of trying to directly unravel the impact that had Bergson’s writing unto the development of this trend of modern Chinese Philosophy, this paper relocates this philosophical issue into the context of “translingual practices” (Liu, 1997). To understand how those authors appropriated Bergson’s philosophy, one has first to become aware of the discrepancies and innovations produced by the translation and the introduction of Bergson works in Chinese. To do so, the paper analyses two sets of documents: first a selection of Chinese translations of “An introduction to metaphysics”, published between 1918 and 1921; and then several articles dealing with Bergson’s philosophy, notably the special issue of People’s Bell (Minduo 民鐸) dedicated to Bergson in 1921.
The first part of the article summarizes the conclusions of a previous French article concerning the Chinese translations of Bergson’s “An introduction to metaphysics” (Ciaudo, 2013). Through a case study of three translations successively realized by Liu Shuya (Liu, 1918), Cai Yuanpei (Cai, 1921) and Yang Zhengyu (1921a), I had put emphasis on several difficulties encountered by the translators. All those translators had worked from English or German translations of Bergson. As such, their own Chinese version prolonged quite a few French-English or French-German mismatches. Sometimes, they even produced very far-fetched neologisms. For instance, in Cai’s version, “sympathie intellectuelle” turned into zhili de ganru 智力的感入 a word mimicking the German “intellektueller Einfühlung”. All the translators also came across linguistic difficulties: for instance, they couldn’t translate “un absolu” into Chinese; it was rendered juedui 絕對, without any pronoun. Nevertheless, the most important aspect of these translations is that they all turned “intuition” into a Chinese word inextricably linked to moral issues. Two translations were used: either zhijue直覺 or zhiguan 直觀. Zhiguan had been used previously by Japanese scholars such as Nishida Kitarō (Nishida, 1910), and turned into the current Japanese translation for “intuition”. It seems to have been an indirect reference to Shao Yong “considering things from things” (yi wu guan wu 以物觀物) (Shao, 2010, p. 49). Zhijue was a brand-new word, but was immediately associated with Neo-Confucian philosophy. In a note, Liu Shuya wrote : “The term zhijue is not very appropriate, while consulting the texts in European languages [I thought] that it was not different from what Cheng Zhengshu called the ‘knowledge of/as virtue’ Master Cheng said : ‘Knowledge from seeing and hearing is not knowledge of/as virtue. It results from the contact between one thing and another thing and therefore is not internal. The knowledge of those erudite and skillful persons belongs to this type of knowledge. Knowledge of/as virtue does not rely upon hearing and seeing’. This is in symbiosis with Bergson intuitive philosophy” (Liu, 1918, p. 102) . In 2013, I had concluded that the echoes produced by the Chinese wording of the intuition concept led to a moralization of the notion in the context of modern Chinese philosophy.
Taking these results as starting point, the paper investigates two entwined issues: Why did zhijue become the most popular word used to speak about intuition? Can we trace in the presentations of Bergson works the reasons why “intuition” was quickly associated to Neo-Confucian philosophy? To answer these questions, I dismiss the philosophical approach to the problem – that would have meant to propose a new reading of Bergson – and choose to work in the framework of “conceptual history”. My methodology tries to maintain a balance between the method uphold by Quentin Skinner and that of Reinhart Koselleck. The former is employed especially when I consider these philosophical discourse as performative acts whereas the latter posits that “a concept bundles up the variety of historical experience together with a collection of theoretical and practical references into a relation that is given and can be experienced only through the concept” (Koselleck, 2004, p. 85). In doing so, this paper intends to offer a first entry in the history of the concept of intuition in China by articulating the sociopolitical background and the emergence of a new philosophical repertoire.
After these long preliminary remarks on the translation of Bergson, I try to map the uses of the words zhijue and zhiguan in the intellectual field of the time. By reviewing several articles dealing with Bergson’s philosophy (mainly taken from the Minduo 1921 journal), I pinpoint the fact that beyond a difference in the way of writing “intuition” in Chinese laid a difference in the understanding of what it meant. This fact is especially obvious when one considers authors such as Li Shicen (Li, 1921), Yang Zhengyu (Yang, 1921b) or Fan Shoukang (Fan, 1921) who used both zhijue and zhiguan. Fan Shoukang’s writing is here very clear: while zhiguan is understood as a nominative philosophical concept, zhijue is read as a verb or as a lexical component for “intuitivism” (zhijue zhuyi 直覺主義). Zhijue was in fact a method.
As such, the definition of intuition as the method of metaphysics in “An introduction to metaphysics” (1903) seems to have played an important role on the Chinese philosophical scene. Feng Youlan presented Bergson philosophy as “a revolution in the philosophic method” (yi ge zhexue fangfa de geming 一個哲學方法的革命) (Feng, 1921, p. 15). The focus on the question of method is also obvious when considering the interview that Zhang Junmai and Lin Zaiping had with the French philosopher (Zhang, 1921). Almost all their questions revolved around the practice of intuition: “Is the intuitive method inborn, or can it be cultivated (xiuyang 修养)?” asked Zhang, while Lin enquired, “how to put in practice the intuitive method? Can it be taught?” (Zhang, 1921). They discussed whether intuition could be understood as a type of meditation (jingzuo 静坐). This interview of Bergson, that soon became become authoritative (Cai, 1984, pp. 361-362; Guo, 1936, pp.273-275), also dismissed the link between Bergson and Buddhism.
In the last part of this article, I focus on the reasons why many pro-Confucian thinkers condemned the association of Bergson’s intuition to Buddhism on a theoretical level (see notably Liang, 1921). While “intuition” as a philosophical concept was no longer associated to traditional Buddhist concepts such as Pratyaksha (xianliang 現量) and Anumâna (biliang 比量), it found its place in a discourse about self-introspection (neisheng 内省) – a wording directly referring to Zeng zi 曾子 threefold introspection (wu ri san sheng 吾日三省) (The Analects, I, 4). Liang would even goes as far as considering zhijue similar to Confucius ren 仁 (Liang, 2005, p. 453) Bergson’s affirmation that we can all grasp intuitively “our self which endures” opened a door toward the Neo-Confucian self-culture practices (xiushen 修身). As a result, Chinese intellectuals used Bergson’s intuition as a device for ethical inquiries sooner than the philosopher himself even started to write his moral philosophy. Meanwhile, they produced a discourse in defense of Confucianism. Under attacks in the political realm, Neo-Confucian philosophy found in the “intuition” a modern western concept to champion its value.
In conclusion, the article argues that, by associating Bergson’s intuition with Cheng Yi’s “knowledge of/as virtue”, Liu Shuya’s writing has contributed to the emergence of a modern Chinese concept. The association between “intuition” in Bergson’s wording and Neo-Confucian philosophy was also possible thanks to the dismissal of Buddhist typology. As zhijue was read as a method, and more specifically as a mean to know oneself, it soon turned into a strong philosophical tool to defend the value of Neo-Confucian philosophy.

Most translations of philosophical texts are characterized by linguistic hybridity. In this paper I will exemplify this phenomenon utilizing Italian translations of Heidegger’s conceptuality. The aim of this study is not to discuss the untranslatability of philosophical concepts, or to question whether certain terms have been translated correctly or poorly, or how they could be better translated. Rather, I will focus on translation as a self-reflexive, self-referential moment in translated philosophical texts. The following reflections will be developed on and with Heidegger, inasmuch as the translation of his concepts will be considered through his own concept of Ent-fernung (de-severance). Ent-fernung is an example of a term that Heidegger has reinterpreted etymologically. While in colloquial German language, “Entfernung” refers to the distance (Ferne), Heidegger emphasizes the privative prefix Ent- (de-), referring thus with the term Ent-fernung to the removal of the “distance”.
Two theses will be discussed. Firstly, that translation is a negotiation of Ent-fernungen. This means conceptualizing translation as a process of approximation, as a process of de-severance. As will become apparent, though, in philosophical translations it is not only the source text which is brought closer to the reader through translation, as we are used to in eve-ryday life when we read recipes or instructions. In philosophical texts, translation rather seem to bring itself closer, to impose itself on the reader, revealing to him/her in which way the term under translation has been interpreted (i.e. translated). In revealing itself, translation acts as a heuristic function for the philosophical concept.
In the second thesis I will discuss how the self-revelatory nature of philosophical transla-tion forces the reader to reconsider, that is, to renegotiate (Eco) what seemed to him/her al-ready understood. As in philosophical texts translation potentially induces more doubts than certainty it can be understood not only as the result of a process of negotiation (Eco), but above all, as a process of revealing new spaces for philosophical negotiation.