The (un)avoidable “Monstrous Disgusting Bug” (Ungeheueres Ungeziefer) in the Retranslation of Kafka’s Die Verwandlung
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-7968.2021.e83254Abstract
This article discusses issues brought about by the practice of retranslating a classic work and its implications for the literary system of the target language, based on a specific case, which consists of Franz Kafka’s Die Verwandlung (The Metamorphosis) retranslation for the Brazilian readership, a commissioned work that I did for a Brazilian publisher in 2019. It starts with a terminological and complex question to be solved in any target language: How to translate the term Ungeziefer into Portuguese? The term, which appears in the very first lines of Kafka’s novella to define the new configuration of the metamorphosed protagonist Gregor Samsa, was translated as “insect” in the various translations of the work published in Brazil. The proposal for a new translation for the word Ungeziefer, in this context, encounters obstacles that will be discussed from the most elementary question that arises when thinking about a retranslation: Why retranslating a work already translated? And now a more targeted question for the target readership: Why translating Die Verwandlung into Brazilian Portuguese if there is already an remarkable translation, or, if we prefer, “consecrated” translation (Deane-Cox 33), from 1985, made by the Brazilian Germanist Modesto Carone (1937-2019)?
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