Drawing on the premises that “translation always introduces a text – a moving body – into a new linguistic, cultural and social context, in which a new story is built around this foreign object”, the essay investigates translation both as a material transposition of the embodied experience of Chimimanda Adichies’ African and Afro-diasporic experience and how the reframing of her stories as the texts/women’s bodies are translated into Italian language and cultural value system. Since the translations into Italian of Nigerian literature, or African literatures in general, remain very scant in Italy, and even more rare in case of women writers, my essay wants to propose an analysis of the nest known texts by a Nigerian writer, Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie, which have all be translated into Italian and to analyse the reason of this exception. My essay will deal with two main points: the translation of Adichie’s works and the reframing of her persona and of her work into the Italian literary panorama and an analysis of Adichie’s self-representation as an author and as a feminist in her website and blog. Methodologically this work is based on the recent debate on transnational texts and the importance of translation into other languages. Being a star of the literary system, her position as a Nigerian writer clearly includes her works into what has been defined as “narratives of responsibility” which offer a significant reading model exploring issues such as traumas, conflicts and gender issues. My analysis of Adichie’s texts into the Italian context starts from the premises that her stories are completely re-contextualized through the translation process into Italian and for the Italian reading public. We know that translation is a cultural practice embedded in the so-called ‘Translational Turn’ (Bachmann Medick 2018) and that we have to think about the ‘global translatability’ of experiences, cultures and languages. We are also aware that translation makes texts international through a re-packaging for a different market (Henitiuk 2012) and that only as ‘translated readers’ we are able to interpret the transcultural text. Adichie is a pivotal example of all this and of the centrality of literary agents, publishing house promotion, media coverage, the importance of literary prizes and above all, the author’s self-representation in websites and social media. The translation of Adichie’s novels is not simply a question of a literary-cultural translation but of translating the Adichie-product. My analysis will dwell with paratextual elements (the cover, the back cover, the author’s presentation, prefaces or glossaries) which are part of the reframing of the author and her texts in the Italian context and will refer to translation choices made to render the author more accessible to Italian readers.
"A transnational star is born": Reframing Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie for the Italian reader
E. Federici
2022
Abstract
Drawing on the premises that “translation always introduces a text – a moving body – into a new linguistic, cultural and social context, in which a new story is built around this foreign object”, the essay investigates translation both as a material transposition of the embodied experience of Chimimanda Adichies’ African and Afro-diasporic experience and how the reframing of her stories as the texts/women’s bodies are translated into Italian language and cultural value system. Since the translations into Italian of Nigerian literature, or African literatures in general, remain very scant in Italy, and even more rare in case of women writers, my essay wants to propose an analysis of the nest known texts by a Nigerian writer, Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie, which have all be translated into Italian and to analyse the reason of this exception. My essay will deal with two main points: the translation of Adichie’s works and the reframing of her persona and of her work into the Italian literary panorama and an analysis of Adichie’s self-representation as an author and as a feminist in her website and blog. Methodologically this work is based on the recent debate on transnational texts and the importance of translation into other languages. Being a star of the literary system, her position as a Nigerian writer clearly includes her works into what has been defined as “narratives of responsibility” which offer a significant reading model exploring issues such as traumas, conflicts and gender issues. My analysis of Adichie’s texts into the Italian context starts from the premises that her stories are completely re-contextualized through the translation process into Italian and for the Italian reading public. We know that translation is a cultural practice embedded in the so-called ‘Translational Turn’ (Bachmann Medick 2018) and that we have to think about the ‘global translatability’ of experiences, cultures and languages. We are also aware that translation makes texts international through a re-packaging for a different market (Henitiuk 2012) and that only as ‘translated readers’ we are able to interpret the transcultural text. Adichie is a pivotal example of all this and of the centrality of literary agents, publishing house promotion, media coverage, the importance of literary prizes and above all, the author’s self-representation in websites and social media. The translation of Adichie’s novels is not simply a question of a literary-cultural translation but of translating the Adichie-product. My analysis will dwell with paratextual elements (the cover, the back cover, the author’s presentation, prefaces or glossaries) which are part of the reframing of the author and her texts in the Italian context and will refer to translation choices made to render the author more accessible to Italian readers.I documenti in SFERA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
