Abstract
The study concludes with reflections on three major shifts in Wolf’s author-function shown by the translation of her writing into English: increased authoritativeness of the narrative voice; alignment with Anglophone narratives of feminism; and marginalisation of her complex relationship with narratives of socialism. The differences between German and Anglophone responses to Wolf’s 1993 revelation are a product of these interpretive shifts. Analysis of the Wolf translations and paratexts, together with archival material, shows that translated authorship is subject to re-narration on many levels as it is recontextualised by institutional agents involved in the translation process. The conclusions presented here reveal the importance of understanding the translated text and author-function in their own right and explore some of the tensions that underlie “international” authorship.
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Notes
- 1.
Unfortunately, it has not been possible to access Wolf’s correspondence with her translators, archived at the Akademie der Künste, which would have provided insight into her degree of involvement in the publication of the English texts. My own personal correspondence with Christopher Middleton, Heike Schwarzbauer and Martin Chalmers suggests that most had no direct contact with the author, although in her foreword to Parting from Phantoms, Jan van Heurck reports an encounter in 1991 and previous correspondence (van Heurck 1994: x–xi).
- 2.
“One day we will want to know who she was, who is being forgotten. Will want to see her, she would probably understand that. Will wonder whether that other figure really existed, on whom sorrow obstinately insists. Will, then, be compelled to bring her forth, for once. So that the doubts are silenced and she is seen. When, if not now?”
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Summers, C. (2017). Conclusion: What Remains?. In: Examining Text and Authorship in Translation. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-40183-6_6
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