Translation or Transcreation? Ghost Stories in Charles Causley’s Poems for Children

Abstract

Charles Causley (1917–2003), born in Launceston, Cornwall, was according to the British literary critics one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century (Hanke, Causley and His Critics. In Through the Granite Kingdom. Critical Essays on Charles Causley, ed. Michael Hanke, 6, 2011). He is recognised primarily as a children’s poet, although he also wrote for adults. Causley himself did not see the distinction between the two strands of writing and claimed that there is no cut-off point between childhood and adulthood. Although truly admired by fellow writers, Causley is a most underrated poet (Hanke, Causley and His Critics. In Through the Granite Kingdom. Critical Essays on Charles Causley, ed. Michael Hanke, 6, 2011) and he is barely known outside the United Kingdom as there are very few translations of his poems (including only one translated into Polish).

Although Causley’s work is characterised by its simplicity, there are often deeper meanings hidden behind it. Causley took inspiration from the folklore of his native Cornwall and, in his production, he included references to the people and places that surrounded him. Even though ghosts, horror stories, and murders were never the focus of his work, he was well able to write about them. This chapter aims at establishing to what extent the translations of his works with horror themes, carried out by student translators, are translations or transcreations.