"Out of the marvellous2 as i have known it

translating Heaney's poetry

Marco Sonzogni

pp. 377-405

in: Jean Boase-Beier, Lina Fisher, Hiroko Furukawa (eds), The Palgrave handbook of literary translation, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018

Abstract

In this study Sonzogni sheds light on three questions: (1) does it matter if the author to be translated is alive? (2) does it matter if the translator knows the author? (3) does it matter if the translator is familiar with the author's "place of writing"? If the logical answer to each question were affirmative, would a triple "yes' to this set of hypotheses describe the ideal "place of translating"? Moving from Heaney's own place of writing—"as much a geographical and historical place as a psychological and transcendent one"; "a zone of fortitude and fairness, of consciousness and conscience" (Hart)—the study returns to Sonzogni's own place of translating his poetry, reliving the miracle as he has known it: a responsible and rewarding collaboration.

Cited authors

Heaney Seamus