In the context of increased movement across borders, this book examines how key cultural texts and concepts are transferred between nations and languages as well as across different media. The texts examined in this book are considered fundamental to their source culture and can also take on a particular relevance to other (target) cultures. The chapters investigate cultural transfers and differences realised through translation and reflect critically upon the implications of these with regard to matters of cultural identity. The book offers an important contribution to cultural approaches in translation studies, with ramifications across different disciplines, including literary studies, history, philosophy, and gender studies. The chapters offer a range of cultural and methodological frameworks and are written by scholars from a variety of language and cultural backgrounds, Western and Eastern.

• Key Cultural Texts in Translation
• Editorial page
• Title page
• LCC data
• Dedication page
• Table of contents
• About the contributors
• Introduction: Key Cultural Texts in translation
  • References
• Part I. Gender and identity
• Chapter 1. Genos, sex, gender and genre
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  • 5.
  • References
• Chapter 2. Dancing through the waves of feminism: Martha Graham and Marie Chouinard as intersemiotic translators
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Martha Graham – Rite of Spring
  • 3. Marie Chouinard – Le Sacre du printemps
  • 4. Conclusion
  • References
• Part II. Texts and politics
• Chapter 3. Bartolomé de Las Casas’ Breve Relación de la Destrucción de Las Indias (Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies) (1552) in translation: The politics of linguistic and cultural appropriation
  • 1. Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies (1552)
  • 2. The Spanish Colonie (1583)
  • 3. Le miroir de la tyrannie Espagnole perpetrée aux Indes Occidentales (1620)
  • 4. The Tears of the Indians (1656)
  • 5. Conclusion
  • References
• Chapter 4. Have English translations of Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung, an icon of German culture, been affected by the changing relationship between Germany and Britain in the twentieth century?
  • 1. Performance and Translation History
  • 2. Wagner’s Ring and anti-Semitism
  • 3. The translations – pre WWI and post WW2: traces of anti-Semitism?
  • References
• Chapter 5. Communicating change: Two contemporary Polish novels in translation into English
  • 1. Key Cultural Texts and the concept of change
  • 2. Mapping the journey
  • 3. Historical context: Poland after 1989
  • 4. Narratives of new Poland
  • 5. Words of the past
  • 6. Dialogue with tradition
  • 7. Educating Polish Queens
  • 8. Thugs will be thugs
  • 9. Conclusion
  • Bibliography
• Part III. Texts and places
• Chapter 6. Lithuanian literature in English: Two English translations of Romualdas Granauskas’s short story “The Bread Eaters” (1975)
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Romualdas Granauskas’s “The Bread Eaters” and its two translations into English
  • 3. A corpus-based evaluation of the two English translations of “The Bread Eaters”
  • 4. Conclusions
  • References
• Chapter 7. Woest of wild: Translating Yorkshire culture in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights
  • Introduction
  • 1. The Yorkshire setting in Wuthering Heights
  • 2. Yorkshire character in Joseph’s dialect in Wuthering Heights
  • Conclusion
  • References
• Chapter 8. Polish dance in Eugene Onegin: What can be found in translation
  • 1. Introductory remarks
  • 2. The legacy of Eugene Onegin in English
  • 3. The translators’ vision of Eugene Onegin: What to bring to the reader
  • 4. What can be gained in translation: The metaphor of the Polish dance in Eugene Onegin
  • 5. Concluding remarks
  • References
• Part IV. Occident and Orient
• Chapter 9. The image of H. C. Andersen’s tales in China (1909–1925): A case study of a set of Key Cultural Texts in translation
  • 1. The concept of a “Key Cultural Text”
  • 2. H. C. Andersen’s tales as KCTs
  • 3. The early translations and introductions of Andersen’s tales
  • 4. The translated image of H. C. Andersen: A classic fairytale writer
  • References
• Chapter 10. The cultural transformation of classical Chinese poetry in translation into English
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. The use of footnotes and annotations
  • 3. Tackling implicit poetic expressions
  • 4. Literal vs free renderings
  • 5. Mediation and borrowing between cultures
  • 6. Conclusion
  • References
• Chapter 11. The immigration of key cultural icons: A case study of church name translation in Macao
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. An overview of concepts relevant to the translation of church names in Macao
  • 3. Data and scope of the study
  • 4. Analysis
  • 5. Discussion
  • 6. Conclusion
  • Acknowledgement
  • References
• Chapter 12. Reproduction and reception of the concepts of Confucianism, Buddhism and polygamy: Kuunmong in translation
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Confucianism, Buddhism and polygamy: Key cultural concepts in pre-modern Korea
  • 3. Representation of Confucianism, Buddhism and polygamy in translation
  • 4. Reception of Confucianism, Buddhism and polygamy
  • 5. Conclusion
  • References
• Part V. Translating philosophy
• Chapter 13. Hegel’s Phenomenology: A comparative analysis of translatorial hexis
  • 1. Introduction: Political philosophy and the translation of cultural capital
  • 2. The translator’s hexis as a theoretical starting point
  • 3. Baillie’s translations of Geist: A textual embodiment of translatorial hexis
  • 4. From Baillie to Pinkard: Terminological consistency as the new hexis
  • 5. Conclusions
  • References
• Chapter 14. Adorno refracted: German critical theory in the neoliberal world order
  • 1. Hope and suffering in the age of identity thinking
  • 2. Translation’s suffering: Critical theory under the spell of advanced capitalism
  • 3. Translation’s hope: Non-identity rescued?
  • 4. The language of suffering refracted
  • References
• Part VI. Text types
• Chapter 15. Construction of a cultural narrative through translation: Texts on Sibelius and his works as Key Cultural Texts
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. The socio-political context in early 20th-century Finland
  • 3. Sibelius as a Finnish narrative
  • 4. Sibelius-related translations into Finnish as Key Cultural Texts
  • 5. Conclusion
  • References
• Chapter 16. Cultural satirical features in translation: The Pessoptimist as a case study
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Satire: Towards a better understanding
  • 3. The Pessoptimist as a Key Cultural Text
  • 4. Methodology
  • 5. Discourse world
  • 6. Satirical method
  • 7. Satirical uptake
  • 8. Results
  • 9. Conclusion
  • References
• Chapter 17. Alterity, orality and performance in Bible translation
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Psalm 24 as the performance of alterity
  • 3. Proverbs and the performance of wisdom
  • 4. Conclusions
  • Acknowledgement
  • References
• Index of concepts
• Index of names and titles