Gender and the Metaphorics of Translation

Author(s): Lori Chamberlain

Source: Signs, Vol. 13, No. 3 (Spring, 1988), pp. 454-472
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
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GENDER AND THE METAPHORICS
OF TRANSLATION

LORI CHAMBERLAIN

In a letterto the nineteenth-century violinistJoseph Joachim,Clara

Schumann declares, "Bin ich auch nicht producierend, so doch
reproducierend" (Even if I am not a creative artist,still I am re-
creating).' While she played an enormously importantrole repro-
ducing her husband's works, both in concert and later in preparing
editions of his work, she was also a composer in her own right;yet
until recently,historians have focused on only one composer in this
family.Indeed, as feminist scholarship has amply demonstrated,
conventional representations of women-whether artistic, social,
economic, or political-have been guided by a culturalambivalence
about the possibility of a woman artistand about the status of wom-
an's "work." In the case of Clara Schumann, it is ironic that one of

I want to acknowledge and thank the many friendswhose conversations with

me have helped me clarifymythinkingon the subject ofthisessay: Nancy Armstrong,
Michael Davidson, Page duBois, Julie Hemker, Stephanie Jed, Susan Kirkpatrick,
and KathrynShevelow.
Joseph Joachim,Briefe von und an JosephJoachim, ed. Johannes Joachimand
Andreas Moser, 3 vols. (Berlin: Julius Bard, 1911-13), 2:86; cited in Nancy B. Reich,
Clara Schumann: The Artistand the Woman (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell UniversityPress,
1985), 320; the translationis Reich's. See the chapter entitled "Clara Schumann as
Composer and Editor," 225-57.

[Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 1988, vol. 13, no. 3]
?1988 by The Universityof Chicago. All rightsreserved. 0097-9740/88/1303-0011$01.00

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

the reasons she could notbe a moreproductivecomposeris that

she was keptbusywiththeeightchildrenshe and RobertSchumann
producedtogether.
Fromourvantagepoint,we recognizeclaimsthat"thereare no
greatwomen artists"as expressionsof a gender-basedparadigm
concerningthe dispositionofpowerin the familyand the state.As
feministresearchfroma varietyof disciplineshas shown,the op-
positionbetweenproductiveand reproductive workorganizesthe
waya culturevalues work:thisparadigmdepictsoriginality orcrea-
tivityin termsof paternityand authority, relegatingthe figureof
the femaleto a varietyof secondaryroles. I am interestedin this
oppositionspecifically as itis used to markthedistinction between
writingand translating-marking, thatis, theone to be originaland
"masculine,"the otherto be derivativeand "feminine."The dis-
tinctionis onlysuperficially a problemofaesthetics,forthereare
important consequences in the areas of publishing,royalties,cur-
riculum,and academic tenure.WhatI proposehere is to examine
whatis at stakeforgenderin the representation oftranslation:the
struggleforauthority and the politicsoforiginality informing this
struggle.
"At best an echo,"2translationhas been figuredliterallyand
metaphorically in secondaryterms.Justas Clara Schumann'sper-
formanceofa musicalcompositionis seen as qualitativelydifferent
fromtheoriginalactofcomposingthatpiece, so theactoftranslating
is viewed as somethingqualitativelydifferent fromthe originalact
of writing.Indeed, under currentAmericancopyrightlaw, both
translations and musicalperformances are treatedunderthe same
rubricof"derivativeworks."3 The culturalelaborationofthisview
suggeststhatin the originalabides what is natural,truthful, and
lawful,in the copy,whatis artificial, false,and treasonous.Trans-
lationscan be, forexample,echoes (in musical terms),copies or
portraits(in painterlyterms),or borrowedor ill-fitting clothing(in
sartorialterms).
The sexualizationoftranslation appearsperhapsmostfamiliarly
in the tag les belles infideles-likewomen,the adage goes, trans-
lationsshouldbe eitherbeautifulor faithful. The tag is made pos-
sible bothby the rhymein Frenchand by the factthatthe word
traductionis a feminineone, thusmakingles beaux infidelesim-
possible. This tag owes its longevity-itwas coined in the seven-
2This is the title of an essay by Armando S. Pires, Americas 4, no. 9 (1952):
13-15, cited in On Translation, ed. Reuben A. Brower (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
UniversityPress, 1959), 289.
3United States Code Annotated,Title 17, Sect. 101 (St. Paul, Minn.: West Pub-
lishing Co., 1977).

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

teenthcentury4-tomorethanphoneticsimilarity: whatgivesitthe
appearance of truthis thatit has captureda culturalcomplicity
between the issues of fidelityin translationand in marriage.For
les belles infideles,fidelityis definedby an implicitcontractbe-
tween translation(as woman)and original(as husband,father,or
author).However,the infamous"double standard"operateshere
as it mighthave in traditionalmarriages:the "unfaithful"wife/
translationis publiclytriedforcrimesthe husband/original is by
law incapable of committing. This contract,in short,makes it im-
possible forthe originalto be guiltyofinfidelity. Such an attitude
betraysreal anxietyabouttheproblemofpaternity and translation;
it mimicsthe patrilinealkinshipsystemwherepaternity-notma-
ternity-legitimizes an offspring.
It is the strugglefortherightofpaternity, regulatingthe fidelity
oftranslation, whichwe see articulatedby the earl ofRoscommon
in his seventeenth-century In orderto guar-
treatiseon translation.
antee the originality ofthe translator'swork,surelynecessaryin a
paternity case, thetranslatormustusurptheauthor'srole. Roscom-
monbeginsbenignlyenough,advisingthe translator to "Chuse an
authoras you chuse a friend," butthisintimacyservesa potentially
subversivepurpose:

Unitedby thisSympathetick Bond,

You growFamiliar,Intimate,and Fond;
Yourthoughts, yourWords,yourStiles,yourSouls agree,
but He.5
No longerhis Interpreter,

It is an almostsilentdeposition:throughfamiliarity (friendship),
thetranslator becomes,as itwere,partofthefamilyand finallythe
fatherhimself;whateverstruggletheremightbe between author
and translator is veiled by the language of friendship.While the
translator is figuredas a male, the textitselfis figuredas a female
whose chastitymustbe protected:

Withhow muchease is a youngMuse Betray'd

How nice the Reputationofthe Maid!
Yourearly,kind,paternalcare appears,
By chastInstruction ofherTenderYears.
The firstImpressionin her InfantBreast
Will be the deepest and shouldbe the best.
4Roger Zuber, Les "Belles Infideles" et la formation du gout classique (Paris:
Librairie Armand Colin, 1968), 195.
5Earl of Roscommon, "An Essay on Translated Verse," in English Translation
Theory-1650-1800, ed. T. R. Steiner (Amsterdam:Van Gorcum, Assen, 1975), 77.

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

Let no Austerity
breed servileFear
No wantonSound offendherVirginEar.6

As the translatorbecomes the author,he incurscertainpaternal

duties in relationto the text,to protectand instruct-orperhaps
structure-it.The languageused echoes the language of conduct
books and reflectsattitudesabout the properdifferencesin edu-
catingmales and females;"chastInstruction"is properforthe fe-
male,whose virginity is an essentialprerequisiteto marriage.The
text,that blank page bearingtheauthor'simprint ("The first
Impres-
sion . . . Will be thedeepest"),is impossiblytwicevirgin-once for
the originalauthor,and again forthe translator who has takenhis
place. It is this"chastity" which resolves-or represses-the strug-
gle forpaternity.7
The genderingoftranslation by thislanguageofpaternalismis
made moreexplicitin theeighteenth-century treatiseon translation
by Thomas Francklin:

Unless an authorlike a mistresswarms,

How shall we hide his faultsor tastehis charms,
How all his modestlatentbeauties find,
How traceeach lovelierfeatureofthe mind,
Softeneach blemish,and each graceimprove,
And treathimwiththe dignityofLove?8

Like the earl ofRoscommon,Francklinrepresentsthetranslator as

a male who usurpsthe role oftheauthor,a usurpationwhichtakes
place at the level ofgrammatical genderand is resolvedthrougha
sex change.The translator is figuredas a male seducer;the author,
conflatedwiththe conventionally "feminine"featuresof his text,
is thenthe "mistress," and themasculinepronounis forcedto refer
to thefeminineattributes ofthetext("his modestlatentbeauties").
In confusingthe genderofthe authorwiththe ascribedgenderof
the text,Francklin"translates"the creativerole ofthe authorinto
the passive role of the text,renderingthe authorrelativelypow-
erless in relationto the translator.The author-text,now a mistress,
is flatteredand seduced by the translator's attentions,becominga
6Ibid., 78.
70n the woman as blank page, see Susan Gubar, "'The Blank Page' and Issues
of Female Creativity,"in Writingand Sexual Difference, ed. Elizabeth Abel (Chi-
cago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 73-94; see also Stephanie Jed, Chaste
Thinking: The Rape of Lucretia and the Birth of Humanism (Bloomington: Indiana
UniversityPress, in press).
8Thomas Francklin, "Translation: A Poem," in Steiner, ed., 113-14.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

willing collaborator in the project to make herself beautiful-and,

no doubt, unfaithful.
This belle infidele, whose blemishes have been softened and
whose beauties have thereforebeen improved, is depicted both as
mistress and as a portraitmodel. In using the popular painting
analogy, Francklin also reveals the gender coding of that mimetic
convention: the translator/painter must seduce the text in order to
"trace" (translate) the features of his subject. We see a more elab-
orate version of this convention, though one arguing a different
position on the subject of improvementthroughtranslation,in Wil-
liam Cowper's "Preface" to Homer's Iliad: "Should a painter,pro-
fessing to draw the likeness of a beautiful woman, give her more
or fewer featuresthan belong to her, and a general cast of counte-
nance of his own invention, he might be said to have produced a
jeu d'esprit, a curiosity perhaps in its way, but by no means the
lady in question."9 Cowper argues forfidelityto the beautifulmodel,
lest the translationdemean her, reducing her to a mere "jeu d'es-
prit," or, to follow the text yet further,make her monstrous ("give
her more or fewer features"). Yet lurkingbehind the phrase "the
lady in question" is the suggestion that she is the other woman-
the beautiful, and potentiallyunfaithful,mistress.In any case, like
the earl of Roscommon and Francklin, Cowper feminizes the text
and makes her reputation-that is, her fidelity-the responsibility
of the male translator/author.
Justas textsare conventionally figuredin feminineterms,so too
is language: our "mother tongue." And when aesthetic debates
shifted the focus in the late eighteenth centuryfromproblems of
mimesis to those of expression-in Abrams's famous terms, from
the mirrorto the lamp-discussions oftranslationfollowed suit. The
translator'srelationship to this motherfigureis outlined in some of
the same terms that we have already seen-fidelity and chastity-
and the fundamental problem remains the same: how to regulate
legitimate sexual (authorial) relationships and their progeny.
A representative example depicting translationas a problem of
fidelityto the "mother tongue" occurs in the work of Schleier-
macher,whose twin interestsin translationand hermeneutics have
been influential in shaping translationtheory in this century.In
discussing the issue of maintaining the essential foreignness of a
text in translation,Schleiermacher outlines what is at stake as fol-
lows: "Who would not like to permit his mother tongue to stand
fortheverywhere in the most universally appealing beauty each
genre is capable of? Who would not rathersire children who are

9William Cowper, "'Preface' to The Iliad of Homer," in Steiner, ed., 135-36.

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

theirparents'pure effigy, and notbastards?.. . Who would suffer

being accused, like those parentswho abandon theirchildrento
acrobats,of bendinghis mothertongueto foreignand unnatural
dislocationsinstead of skillfullyexercisingit in its own natural
gymnastics?"'? The translator,as father,
mustbe trueto themother/
language in orderto producelegitimateoffspring; ifhe attemptsto
sire children otherwise, he will produce bastardsfitonly forthe
of
circus.Because the mothertongueis conceived as natural,any
tamperingwith it-any infidelity-isseen as unnatural,impure,
monstrous, and immoral.Thus, it is "natural"law whichrequires
monogamousrelationsin orderto maintainthe "beauty" of the
languageand in orderto insurethatthe worksbe genuineor orig-
inal. Thoughhis referenceto bastardchildrenmakesclear thathe
is concernedoverthe purityofthe mothertongue,he is also con-
cernedwiththe paternity ofthe text."Legitimacy"has littleto do
withmotherhoodand moreto do withthe institutional acknowl-
edgmentoffatherhood. The question,"Whois therealfatherofthe
text?"seems to motivatethese concernsabout boththe fidelityof
the translation and the purityofthe language.
In themetaphorics oftranslation,thestruggleforauthorialrights
takesplace bothin the realmof the family, as we have seen, and
in the state,fortranslationhas also been figuredas the literary
equivalentofcolonization,a meansofenrichingboththelanguage
and the literatureappropriateto the politicalneeds of expanding
nations.A typicaltranslator's prefacefromthe Englisheighteenth
centurymakesthisexplicit:"You, myLord,knowhow the works
ofgeniusliftup thehead ofa nationabove herneighbors,and give
as much honoras success in arms;amongthese we mustreckon
ourtranslations oftheclassics;by whichwhenwe havenaturalized
all Greece and Rome,we shall be so muchricherthantheyby so
manyoriginalproductions as we haveofourown."1 Because literary
is
success equated with militarysuccess, translationcan expand
both literaryand politicalborders.A similarattitudetowardthe
enterpriseof translation maybe foundin the GermanRomantics,
whoused ubersetzen(totranslate) and verdeutschen(toGermanize)
interchangeably: translationwas literallya strategyof linguistic
incorporation. The greatmodelforthisuse oftranslation is,ofcourse,
theRomanEmpire,whichso dramatically incorporated Greekcul-
'lFriedrich Schleiermacher, "Uber die verschiedenen Methoden des Ueber-
setzen," trans. Andre Lefevere, in Translating Literature: The German Tradition
from Luther to Rosenzweig, ed. Andre Lefevere (Amsterdam:Van Gorcum, Assen,
1977), 79.
"Cited in Flora Ross Amos, Early Theories of Translation (1920; reprint,New
York: Octagon Books, 1973), 138-39.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

tureintoits own. For the Romans,Nietzscheasserts,"translation

was a formofconquest."12
Then, too,the politicsofcolonialismoverlapsignificantly
with
the politicsof genderwe have seen so far.Flora Amos shows,for
example,thatduringthe sixteenthcenturyin England,translation
is seen as "public duty."The most stunningexample of what is
construedas "public duty" is articulatedby a sixteenth-century
English translatorof Horace named Thomas Drant,who, in the
prefaceto his translation
ofthe Romanauthor,boldlyannounces,

FirstI havenowdone as thepeople ofGod werecommanded

to do with theircaptive women thatwere handsome and
beautiful:I have shavedoffhis hairand pared offhis nails,
thatis, I have wiped away all his vanityand superfluity
of
matter... I have Englishedthingsnotaccordingto thevein
of the Latin propriety,but of his own vulgar tongue. ... I
have pieced his reason,eked and mended his similitudes,
mollifiedhis hardness,prolongedhis cortallkindofspeeches,
changedand muchalteredhis words,but not his sentence,
or at least (I dare say) nothis purpose.13

Drantis freeto takethe libertieshe here describes,for,as a cler-

gymantranslating a secularauthor,he mustmake Horace morally
suitable:he musttransform himfromthe foreignor alien into,sig-
a
nificantly, member of the family.For the passage fromthe Bible
to whichDrantalludes (Deut. 21:12-14) concernsthe properway
to make a captivewomana wife:"Then you shall bringher home
to yourhouse; and she shall shave her head and pare her nails"
(Deut. 21:12, Revised StandardVersion).Aftergivingher a month
in whichto mourn,thecaptorcan thentakeheras a wife;butifhe
findsin herno "delight,"the passage forbidshimsubsequentlyto
sell herbecause he has alreadyhumiliatedher.In makingHorace
suitableto becomea wife,Drantmusttransform himintoa woman,
the uneasy effectsof which remainin the tensionof pronominal
reference,where "his" seems to referto "women." In addition,
Drant'sparaphrasemakesit the husband-translator's dutyto shave
and pare ratherthanthedutyofthecaptiveHorace. Unfortunately,
captorsoftendid muchmorethanshavetheheads ofcaptivewomen
(see Num. 31:17-18); the sexual violence alluded to in this de-
scriptionof translationprovidesan analogue to the politicaland
economicrapes implicitin a colonializingmetaphor.
'2Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kauffmann(New York:
Random House, 1974), 90.
'3Cited in Amos, 112-13.

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Clearly,the meaningof the word "fidelity"in the contextof

translation changesaccordingto the purposetranslation is seen to
servein a largeraestheticor culturalcontext.In its genderedver-
sion,fidelitysometimesdefinesthe (female)translation's relation
to the original,particularlyto the original'sauthor(male),deposed
and replaced by the author(male) of the translation. In thiscase,
thetext,ifit is a good and beautifulone, mustbe regulatedagainst
its propensityforinfidelity in orderto authorizethe originality of
this production.Or, fidelitymightalso define a (male) author-
translator's relationto his (female) mothertongue,the language
intowhichsomethingis beingtranslated.In thiscase, the(female)
languagemustbe protectedagainstvilification. It is, paradoxically,
thissortof fidelitythatcan justifythe rape and pillage of another
languageand text,as we have seen in Drant.But again,thissortof
fidelityis designedto enrichthe "host"languageby certifying the
originalityof translation;the conquests,made captive,are incor-
poratedintothe "worksofgenius" ofa particularlanguage.
It shouldby now be obviousthatthismetaphorics oftranslation
revealsbothan anxietyaboutthemythsofpaternity (or authorship
and authority) and a profoundambivalenceabout the role of ma-
ternity-ranging fromthe condemnationof les belles infidelesto
the adulationaccordedto the "mothertongue."In one ofthe few
attempts todeal withboththepracticeand themetaphorics oftrans-
lation,Serge Gavronsky argues that the source of this anxietyand
ambivalencelies in the oedipal structure whichinforms the trans-
lator'soptions.Gavronskydivides the world of translationmeta-
phorsintotwocamps.The first grouphe labels pietistic:metaphors
based on thecoincidenceofcourtly and Christian traditions, wherein
the conventionalknightpledges fidelityto the unravishedlady,as
the Christianto theVirgin.In thiscase, thetranslator (as knightor
Christian)takesvows ofhumility, poverty-andchastity. In secular
terms,this is called "positional"translation, forit depends on a
well-known hierarchizationoftheparticipants. The verticalrelation
(author/translator)has thusbeen overlaidwithbothmetaphysical
and ethicalimplications,and in thismissionaryposition,submis-
sivenessis nextto godliness.
Gavronsky arguesthatthe master/slave schemaunderlyingthis
metaphoric model oftranslation is preciselythe foundationofthe
oedipal triangle:

Here, in typicallyeuphemisticterms,the slave is a willing

one (a hyperbolicservant,a faithful):
thetranslatorconsiders
himselfas the child ofthefather-creator,
his rival,while the
textbecomes the objectofdesire,thatwhichhas been com-

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

pletelydefinedby the paternalfigure,the phallus-pen.Tra-

ditions(taboos)imposeuponthetranslator a highlyrestricted
ritualrole. He is forcedto curtailhimself(strictlyspeaking)
in ordertorespecttheinterdictions on incest.To tamperwith
thetextwouldtotantamount to eliminating,in partortotally,
the dominantpresent.14
the father-author(ity),

Thus, the "paternalcare" ofwhichthe earl ofRoscommonspeaks

is one manifestation ofthisrepressedincestuousrelationwiththe
text,a second being the concernforthe purityof "mother"(ma-
donna) tongues.
The otherside of the oedipal trianglemaybe seen in a desire
to killthe symbolicfathertext/author. Accordingto Gavronsky, the
alternative tothepietistictranslatoris thecannibalistic, "aggressive
translator who seizes possession of the 'original,'who savorsthe
text,thatis,whotrulyfeedsuponthewords,whoingurgitates them,
and who, thereafter, enunciatesthemin his own tongue,thereby
havingexplicitlyridhimselfofthe'original'creator."5 Whereasthe
"pietistic"modelrepresentstranslators as completelysecondaryto
what is pure and original,the "cannibalistic"model, Gavronsky
claims,liberatestranslators fromservility to "culturaland ideolog-
ical restrictions." WhatGavronskydesires is to freethe translator/
translation fromthe signsofculturalsecondariness,but his model
is unfortunately inscribedwithinthe same set ofbinarytermsand
either/or logic that we have seen in the metaphoricsoftranslation.
Indeed, we can see theextentto whichGavronsky's metaphorsare
still inscribedwithinthatideologyin the followingdescription:
"The originalhas been captured,raped,and incestperformed. Here,
once again,the son is fatherofthe man.The originalis mutilated
beyond recognition;the slave-master dialectic reversed."16 In re-
peatingthe sortofviolence we have already seen so remarkably in
Drant,Gavronsky of
betraysthedynamics power in this"paternal"
system.Whetherthetranslator quietlyusurpstheroleoftheauthor,
thewaytheearlofRoscommonadvocates,ortakesauthority through
moreviolentmeans,power is stillfiguredas a male privilegeex-
ercisedin familyand statepoliticalarenas.The translator, forGav-
ronsky, is a male who repeatson the sexual level the kinds ofcrimes
any colonizingcountry commits on its colonies.
As Gavronsky himselfacknowledges,thecannibalistictranslator
is based on the hermeneuticist model ofGeorge Steiner,the most

14Serge Gavronsky,"The Translator: From Piety to Cannibalism," Sub-stance

16 (1977): 53-62, esp. 55.
15Ibid., 60.
16Ibid.

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

prominent contemporary theorist oftranslation;Steiner'sinfluential

model illustratesthe persistenceofwhatI have called the politics
of originalityand its logic ofviolence in contemporary translation
theory. In his After Babel, Steiner a
proposes four-part process of
translation.The firststep,thatof "initiativetrust,"describes the
translator'swillingnessto take a gamble on the text,trustingthat
thetextwill yield something. As a second step,thetranslator takes
an overtlyaggressivestep,"penetrating"and "capturing"the text
(Steinercalls this "appropriativepenetration"),an act explicitly
comparedto eroticpossession. Duringthe thirdstep,the impris-
onedtextmustbe "naturalized," mustbecomepartofthetranslator's
language,literallyincorporated or embodied. Finally,to compen-
sate forthis "appropriative'rapture,'"the translator mustrestore
thebalance,attemptsomeactofreciprocity to makeamendsforthe
act of aggression.His model forthisact of restitution is, he says,
"thatofLevi-Strauss's Anthropologie structurale which regardsso-
cial structuresas attemptsatdynamicequilibriumachievedthrough
an exchangeofwords,women,and materialgoods."Steinerthereby
makestheconnectionexplicitbetweentheexchangeofwomen,for
example,and the exchangeofwordsin one languageforwordsin
another.'7
Steinermakesthe sexual politicsofhis argumentquite clear in
the openingchapterofhis book,wherehe outlinesthe model for
"totalreading."Translation, as an act ofinterpretation,is a special
case of communication, and communication is a sexual act: "Eros
and languagemeshat everypoint.Intercourseand discourse,cop-
ula and copulation,are sub-classesof the dominantfactof com-
munication.... Sex is a profoundly semanticact."18Steinermakes
note of a culturaltendencyto see thisact of communication from
themale pointofviewand thustovalorizethepositionofthefather/
author/original, but at the same time,he himselfrepeatsthismale
focusin, forexample,the followingdescriptionofthe relationbe-
tween sexual intercourseand communication: "There is evidence
thatthe sexual dischargein male onanismis greaterthan it is in
intercourse. I suspectthatthe determining factoris articulateness,
theabilitytoconceptualizewithespecial vividness.... Ejaculation
is at once a physiologicaland a linguisticconcept.Impotenceand
speech-blocks, premature emissionand stuttering, involuntary ejac-
ulationand the word-river ofdreamsare phenomenawhose inter-
relationsseem to lead back to the centralknotof our humanity.
Semen,excreta,and wordsare communicative products."'9 The al-
17George Steiner, After Babel (London: Oxford University Press, 1975), 296,
298, 300, 302.
18Ibid., 38.
9Ibid., 44, 39.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

lusion here to Levi-Strauss, echoed later in the book in the passage

we have already noted ("an exchange ofwords,women, and material
goods"), provides the narrativeconnecting discourse, intercourse,
and translation,and it does so fromthe point of view of a male
translator.Indeed, we note that when communication is at issue,
that which can be exchanged is depicted at least partially in male
terms ("semen, excreta, and words"), while when "restitution" is
at issue, thatwhich can be exchanged is depicted in female terms.
Writingwithin the hierarchyof gender, Steiner seems to argue
furtherthatthe paradigm is universal and thatthe male and female
roles he describes are essential ratherthan accidental. On the other
hand, he notes that the rules for discourse (and, presumably, for
intercourse) are social, and he outlines some of the consequent
differencesbetween male and female language use:

At a rough guess, women's speech is richer than men's in

those shadings of desire and futurityknown in Greek and
Sanskritas optative; women seem to verbalize a wider range
of qualified resolve and masked promise. ... I do not say
they lie about the obtuse, resistantfabric of the world: they
multiply the facets of reality,they strengthenthe adjective
to allow it an alternativenominal status,in a way which men
often find unnerving. There is a strain of ultimatum,a sep-
aratiststance, in the masculine intonationof the first-person
pronoun; the "I" of women intimatesa more patient bearing,
or did until Women's Liberation. The two language models
follow on Robert Graves's dictum that men do but women
are.20

But, while acknowledging the social and economic forces which

prescribe differences,he wants to believe as well in a basic bio-
logical cause: "Certain linguistic differences do point towards a
physiological basis or, to be exact, towards the intermediaryzone
between the biological and the social."21 Steiner is careful not to
insist on the biological premises, but there is in his own rhetorica
tendency to treateven the socialized differencesbetween male and
female language use as immutable. If the sexual basis of commu-
nication as the basis for translationis to be taken as a universal,
then Steiner would seem to be arguing firmlyin the traditionwe
have here been examining, one in which "men do" but "women
are." This traditionis not, of course, confined to the area of trans-
lation studies, and, given the influence of both Steiner and Levi-
20Ibid., 41.
21
Ibid., 43.

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

Strauss,it is notsurprising
to see genderas the framing
conceptof
communicationin adjacent fields such as semioticsor literary
criticism.22
The metaphorics oftranslation,as theprecedingdiscussionsug-
is a
gests, symptom largerof issues ofwesternculture:ofthepower
relationsas theydivide in termsofgender;ofa persistent(though
notalwayshegemonic)desire to equate languageor languageuse
withmorality;ofa quest fororiginality or unity,and a consequent
intoleranceof duplicity,of what cannotbe decided. The funda-
mentalquestion is, why have the two realms of translationand
genderbeen metaphorically linked?What,in Eco's terms,is the
metonymic code or narrativeunderlyingthese two realms?23
This surveyofthe metaphorsoftranslation would suggestthat
the implied narrativeconcernsthe relationbetween the value of
productionversusthe value ofreproduction. Whatproclaimsitself
to be an aestheticproblemis representedin termsof sex, family,
and the state,and whatis consistently at issue is power.We have
already seen the way the of
concept fidelity is used to regulatesex
and/inthe family, to guaranteethatthe child is the productionof
the father, reproducedby the mother.This regulationis a sign of
the father'sauthority and power; it is a way ofmakingvisible the
paternity of the child-otherwise a fictionof sorts-and thereby
claiming the child as legitimate progeny.It is also,therefore, related
to the owningand bequeathal of property. As in marriage,so in
translation, thereis a legal dimensionto the conceptoffidelity. It
is notlegal (shall I say,legitimate)to publisha translation ofworks
not in the public domain,forexample,withoutthe author's(or
appropriateproxy's)consent;one must,in short,enterthe proper
contractbeforeannouncingthebirthofthe translation, so thatthe
parentage will be clear. The of and
coding production reproduction
marksthe formeras a morevaluable activityby referenceto the
divisionoflaborestablishedforthe marketplace, whichprivileges
maleactivity and paysaccordingly. The transformation oftranslation
froma reproductive activityintoa productiveone,froma secondary
workintoan originalwork,indicatesthecodingoftranslation rights
as property rights-signsofriches,signsofpower.

22In her incisive

critique ofsemiotics argued along these lines, Christine Brooke-
Rose makes a similar point about Steiner's use of Levi-Strauss; see "Woman as
Semiotic Object," Poetics Today 6, nos. 1-2 (1985): 9-20; reprintedin The Female
Body in WesternCulture: Contemporary Perspectives, ed. Susan Rubin Suleiman
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UniversityPress, 1986), 305-16.
23 Umberto Eco, The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics
of Texts
(Bloomington: Indiana UniversityPress, 1979), 68.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

I would furtherargue thatthe reason translationis so overcoded,

so overregulated,is thatit threatensto erase the differencebetween
productionand reproductionwhich is essential to the establishment
of power. Translationscan, in short,masquerade as originals,thereby
short-circuiting the system.That the differenceis essential to main-
tain is argued in terms of life and death: "Every saddened reader
knows that what a poem is most in danger of losing in translation
is its life."24The danger posed by infidelityis here represented in
terms of mortality;in a comment on the Loeb Library translations
ofthe classics, Rolfe Humphries articulatesthe riskin more specific
terms:"They emasculate theiroriginals."25The sexual violence im-
plicit in Drant's figurationof translation,then, can be seen as di-
rected not simply against the female material of the text ("captive
women") but against the sign of male authorityas well; for,as we
know fromthe storyof Samson and Delilah, Drant's cuttingof hair
("I have shaved offhis hair and pared offhis nails, that is, I have
wiped away all his vanity and superfluityof matter") can signify
loss of male power, a symbolic castration.This, then, is what one
criticcalls the manque inevitable: what the original risks losing, in
short,is its phallus, the sign ofpaternity,authority,and originality.26

* * *

In the metaphoric system examined here, what the translator

claims for"himself" is precisely the rightof paternity;he claims a
phallus because this is the only way, in a patriarchalcode, to claim
legitimacyforthe text.To claim thattranslatingis like writing,then,
is to make it a creative-rather than merely re-creative-activity.
But the claims for originalityand authority,made in reference to
acts of artisticand biological creation, exist in sharp contrastto the
place of translationin a literaryor economic hierarchy.For, while
writing and translatingmay share the same figuresof gender di-
vision and power-a concern with the rightsof authorship or au-
thority-translatingdoes not share the redemptive mythsof nobility
or triumph we associate with writing. Thus, despite metaphoric
claims for equality with writers, translatorsare often reviled or
ignored: it is not uncommon to find a review of a translationin a

24JacksonMatthews, "Third Thoughts on Translating Poetry,"in Brower,ed. (n.

2 above), 69.
25Rolfe Humphries, "Latin and English Verse-Some Practical Considerations,"
in Brower, ed., 65.
2Philip Lewis, "Vers la traductionabusive," in Les fins de l'homme: A partir
du travail de Jacques Derrida, ed. Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy
(Paris: Editions Galilee, 1981), 253-61, esp. 255.

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

majorperiodicalthatfailsto mentionthe translator or the process

oftranslation. Translationprojectsin today'suniversitiesare gen-
erallyconsideredonlymarginally appropriateas topicsfordoctoral
dissertationsor as supportfortenure,unless the originalauthor's
statureis sufficient to authorizethe project.While organizations
suchas PEN and ALTA(AmericanLiteraryTranslators Association)
are workingto improvethetranslator's economicstatus,organizing
translators and advisingthemoftheirlegal rightsand responsibil-
ities,even thebest translators are stillpoorlypaid. The academy's
general scorn fortranslationcontrasts sharplywithits relianceon
translation in thestudyofthe"classics" ofworldliterature, ofmajor
philosophical and critical
texts, and of previouslyunread master-
pieces ofthe "third"world.While the metaphorswe have looked
atattempt tocloakthesecondarystatusoftranslation inthelanguage
ofthe phallus,westerncultureenforcesthissecondarinesswitha
vengeance,insistingon the feminizedstatusof translation. Thus,
thoughobviouslybothmen and womenengage in translation, the
binarylogic which encouragesus to definenursesas femaleand
doctorsas male,teachersas femaleand professorsas male, secre-
tariesas femaleand corporateexecutivesas male also definestrans-
lationas, in manyways,an archetypalfeminineactivity.
Whatis also interesting is that,even when the termsof com-
parisonare reversed-whenwritingis said to be like translating-
in ordertostressthere-creative aspectsofbothactivities, thegender
bias does not disappear.For example,in a shortessay by Terry
Eagleton discussingthe relationbetween translationand some
strandsofcurrentcriticaltheory, Eagletonarguesas follows:
It maybe, then,thattranslation fromone languageintoan-
othermaylay bare forus somethingof the veryproductive
mechanismsoftextuality itself... The eccentricyetsugges-
tivecriticaltheoriesofHaroldBloom ... contendthatevery
poeticproduceris locked in Oedipal rivalrywitha "strong"
patriarchal precursor-thatliterary "creation"... is in reality
a matterofstruggle, anxiety,aggression,envyand repression.
The "creator"cannotabolishtheunwelcomefactthat. . his
poem lurksin the shadows of a previouspoem or poetic
tradition,againstthe authority of whichit mustlabourinto
itsown"autonomy." On Bloom'sreading,all poemsaretrans-
lations,or "creativemisreadings," ofothers;and itis perhaps
onlytheliteraltranslatorwhoknowsmostkeenlythepsychic
cost and enthrallment whichall writinginvolves.27
27TerryEagleton, "Translation and Transformation,"Stand 19, no. 3 (1977):
72-77, esp. 73-74.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

Eagleton's point, throughBloom, is thatthe productive or creative

mechanism of writingis not original, that is, texts do not emerge
ex nihilo; rather,both writingand translatingdepend on previous
texts. Reversing the conventional hierarchy,he invokes the sec-
ondary status of translation as a model for writing. In equating
translationand "misreading," however, Eagleton (throughBloom)
"
findstheircommon denominatorto be the strugglewith a 'strong'
patriarchal precursor"; the productive or creative mechanism is,
again, entirely male. The attemptby either Eagleton or Bloom to
replace the concept of originalitywith the concept of creative mis-
reading or translationis a sleight of hand, a change in name only
with respect to gender and the metaphorics of translation,forthe
concept oftranslationhas here been defined in the same patriarchal
terms we have seen used to define originalityand production.
At the same time, however, much of recent critical theory has
called into question the mythsof authorityand originalitywhich
engender this privilegingofwritingover translatingand make writ-
ing a male activity.Theories of intertextuality, for example, make
it difficultto determine the precise boundaries of a text and, as a
consequence, disperse the notion of "origins"; no longer simply
the product of an autonomous (male?) individual, the text rather
findsits sources in history,that is, within social and literarycodes,
as articulated by an author. Feminist scholarship has drawn atten-
tion to the considerable body of writingby women, writing pre-
viously marginalized or repressed in the academic canon; thus this
scholarship brings to focus the conflictbetween theories of writing
coded in male terms and the reality of the female writer. Such
scholarship, in articulatingthe role gender has played in our con-
cepts of writingand production, forces us to reexamine the hier-
archies thathave subordinatedtranslationto a concept oforiginality.
The resultantrevisioningof translationhas consequences, of course,
formeaning-makingactivities of all kinds, fortranslationhas itself
served as a conventional metaphor or model fora varietyof acts of
reading, writing,and interpretation;indeed, the analogy between
translationand interpretationmightprofitablybe examined in terms
of gender,forits use in these discourses surelybelies similar issues
concerning authority,violence, and power.
The most influentialrevisionist theoryof translationis offered
by Jacques Derrida, whose project has been to subvert the very
concept of differencewhich produces the binary opposition be-
tween an original and its reproduction-and finallyto make this
difference undecidable. By drawing many of his terms fromthe
lexicon of sexual difference-dissemination, invagination,hymen-
Derrida exposes gender as a conceptual frameworkfordefinitions
of mimesis and fidelity,definitionscentral to the "classical" way of
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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

viewingtranslation. The problemof translation, implicitin all of

his work,has become increasingly explicitsince his essay "Living
On /BorderLines," thepretextsforwhichare Shelley's "Triumph
ofLife" and Blanchot'sL'arretde mort.28 In suggestingthe "inter-
translatability"of thesetexts,he violates conventional attitudesnot
only toward translation,but also toward influence and authoring.
The essay is on translationin manysenses: appearingfirstin
English-that is, in translation-itcontainsa runningfootnoteon
the problemsof translating his own ambiguoustermsas well as
thoseof Shelley and Blanchot.In the process,he exposes the im-
possibilityof the "dream of translationwithoutremnants";there
is, he argues,always somethingleftover whichblursthe distinc-
tionsbetween originaland translation. There is no "silent" trans-
lation.For example,he notes the importanceof the words ecrit,
recit,and seriein Blanchot'stextand asks: "Note to thetranslators:
How are you going to translatethat,recit,forexample? Not as
nouvelle,'novella, noras 'shortstory.'Perhapsit will be betterto
leave the 'French' wordrecit.It is alreadyhardenoughto under-
stand,in Blanchot'stext,in French."29
The impossibility oftranslatinga wordsuchas recitis,according
to Derrida,a functionofthe law oftranslation, nota matterofthe
translation'sinfidelityor secondariness.Translationis governedby
a double bindtypified bythecommand,"Do notreadme": thetext
bothrequiresand forbidsitstranslation. Derridarefersto thisdou-
ble bind of translation as a hymen,the sign of bothvirginity and
consummation ofa marriage.Thus, in attempting to overthrow the
binaryoppositionswe have seen in otherdiscussionsofthe prob-
lem,Derridaimpliesthattranslation is bothoriginaland secondary,
uncontaminated and transgressed ortransgressive. Recognizingtoo
thatthetranslator is frequently
a woman-so thatsexand thegender-
ascribed secondarinessof the task frequentlycoincide-Derrida
goes on toarguein The Ear oftheOtherthat"thewomantranslator
in thiscase is notsimplysubordinated, she is notthe author'ssec-
retary.She is also theone who is loved bytheauthorand on whose
basis alone writingis possible. Translationis writing;thatis, it is
nottranslation onlyin the sense oftranscription. It is a productive
writingcalled forthby the originaltext."30 By arguingthe inter-
dependenceofwritingand translating, Derridasubvertstheauton-

28JacquesDerrida, "Living On /Border Lines," trans.James Hulbert, in Decon-

struction and Criticism, ed. Harold Bloom et al. (New York: Seabury Press, 1979),
75-176.
29Ibid., 119, 86.
30Ibid., 145; Jacques Derrida, The Ear
of the Other: Otobiography,Transference,
Translation, ed. Christie V. McDonald, trans. Peggy Kamuf (New York: Schocken
Books, 1985), 153.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

omyand privilegeofthe"original"text,bindingittoan impossible

but necessarycontractwiththe translationand makingeach the
debtorofthe other.
In emphasizingboththereproductive and productiveaspectsof
translation,Derrida'sproject-and,ironically, thetranslation ofhis
works-provides a basis for a necessaryexploration of the contra-
dictionsoftranslation and gender.Alreadyhis workhas generated
a collectionof essays focusingon translationas a way of talking
about philosophy,interpretation, and literaryhistory.31 These es-
says, while notexplicitlyaddressingquestions gender,build on
of
his ideas about the doubleness oftranslation withouteitherideal-
or
izing subordinating translationto conventionallyprivilegedterms.
Derrida's own work,however,does not attendclosely to the his-
toricalorculturalcircumstances ofspecifictexts,circumstances that
cannotbe ignoredin investigating theproblematicsoftranslation.32
For example,in some historicalperiods women were allowed to
translatepreciselybecause it was definedas a secondaryactivity.33
Our taskas scholars,then,is to learn to listento the "silent" dis-
course-of women,as translators-inorderto betterarticulatethe
relationshipbetween whathas been coded as "authoritative" dis-
courseand whatis silenced in thefearofdisruption or subversion.
Beyondthiskindofscholarship,whatis requiredfora feminist
theoryof translationis a practicegovernedby what Derrida calls
the double bind-not the double standard.Such a theorymight
rely,noton thefamilymodelofoedipal struggle, buton thedouble-
edged razoroftranslation as collaboration,whereauthorand trans-
latorare seen as workingtogether, bothin the cooperativeand the
subversivesense. This is a model thatrespondsto the concerns
voiced by an increasinglyaudible numberof women translators
whoarebeginningtoask,as SuzanneJillLevinedoes,whatitmeans
to be a womantranslator in and ofa male tradition.Speakingspe-
cificallyof her recenttranslationof CabreraInfante'sLa Habana

31JosephF. Graham, ed., Difference in Translation (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Uni-

versityPress, 1985).
32 For a
critique of Derrida's "Living On /Border Lines" along these lines, see
Jeffrey Mehlman's essays, "Deconstruction, Literature,History:The Case ofL'Arret
de mort," in Literary History: Theory and Practice, ed. Herbert L. Sussman, Pro-
ceedings of the NortheasternUniversityCenter forLiteraryStudies (Boston, 1984),
and "Writingand Deference: The Politics of LiteraryAdulation," in Representations
15 (Summer 1986): 1-14.
33Margaret P. Hannay, ed., Silent But for the Word: Tudor Women as Patrons,
Translators, and Writers of Religious Works (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University
Press, 1985).

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 Spring1988 / SIGNS

para un infantedifunto,a textthat"mockswomenand theirwords,"

she asks, "Where does thisleave a womanas translator of such a
book? Is she nota double betrayer, to play Echo to thisNarcissus,
repeatingthearchetype once again?All who use themother'sfather-
tongue, who echo the ideas and discourseof greatmen are, in a
sense, betrayers: this is the contradiction and compromiseof dis-
sidence."34The verychoice of textsto workwith,then,poses an
initial dilemma forthe feministtranslator:while a textsuch as
CabreraInfante'smaybe ideologicallyoffensive, notto translateit
would capitulateto thatlogic whichascribesall powerto the orig-
inal. Levine chooses insteadto subvertthe text,to play infidelity
againstinfidelity, and to followout the text'sparodiclogic. Carol
in
Maier, discussingthe contradictions of her relationshipto the
Cuban poet OctavioArmand,makes a similarpoint,arguingthat
"the translator's quest is notto silence but to give voice, to make
availabletextsthatraise difficult questionsand open perspectives.
It is essentialthatas translators womenget underthe skinofboth
antagonisticand sympathetic works.They mustbecome indepen-
dent, 'resisting'interpreters who not only let antagonisticworks
speak ... butalso speak with them and place themina largercontext
bydiscussingthemand theprocessoftheirtranslation."35 Her essay
recountsher struggleto translatethe silencingof the motherin
Armand'spoetryand how,by "resisting"her own silencingas a
translator, she is able togivevoice tothecontradictions in Armand's
work.By refusingto repressherown voice while speakingfor the
voice ofthe"master," Maier,likeLevine,speaksthrough and against
translation. Bothofthesetranslators' workillustrates theimportance
notonlyoftranslating butofwritingaboutit,makingtheprinciples
of a practicepartof the dialogue about revisingtranslation.It is
onlywhenwomentranslators beginto discusstheirwork-andwhen
enoughhistoricalscholarshipon previouslysilencedwomentrans-
latorshas been done-that we will be able to delineatealternatives
to the oedipal strugglesforthe rightsofproduction.
For feminists workingon translation, muchor even mostofthe
terrainis stilluncharted. Wecan,forexample,examinethehistorical
role oftranslation in women'swritingin different periodsand cul-
tures;the special problemsoftranslating explicitlyfeministtexts,
as forexample,in MyriamDiaz-Diocaretz'sdiscussionoftheprob-

34Suzanne Jill Levine, "Translation as (Sub)Version: On Translating Infante's

Inferno," Sub-stance 42 (1984): 92.
35Carol Maier, "A Woman in Translation, Reflecting,"Translation Review, no.
17 (1985), 4-8, esp. 4.

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Chamberlain / TRANSLATION

lems oftranslating AdrienneRich intoSpanish;36the effectsofthe

canonand themarketplaceon decisionsconcerningwhichtextsare
translated, by whom,and how thesetranslations are marketed;the
effectsoftranslationson canonand genre;theroleof"silent"forms
of writingsuch as translationin articulating woman's speech and
subvertinghegemonic forms of expression.Feministand post-
structuralisttheory encouragedus to read between or outside
has
the lines ofthe dominantdiscourseforinformation about cultural
formation and authority;translationcan providea wealth of such
information about practicesof dominationand subversion.In ad-
dition,as both Levine's and Maier's commentsindicate,one ofthe
challenges forfeminist is to move beyondquestionsof
translators
the sex oftheauthorortranslator. Workingwithintheconventional
hierarchieswe have alreadyseen, the femaletranslator ofa female
author'stextand the male translator ofa male author'stextwill be
bound by the same powerrelations:whatmustbe subvertedis the
processby whichtranslation complieswithgenderconstructs.In
thissense,a feminist theory translation
of will finallybe utopic.As
women writetheirown metaphors of cultural production,it may
be possible to considerthe acts of authoring,creating,or legiti-
mizinga textoutsideofthegenderbinariesthathavemade women,
mistressesofthesortofworkthatkeptClara Schu-
like translations,
mannfromhercomposing.

Boalt Hall School of Law

of California,Berkeley
University
36Myriam Diaz-Diocaretz, Translating Poetic Discourse: Questions on Feminist
Strategies in Adrienne Rich (Amsterdam/Philadelphia:John Benjamins Publishing
Co., 1985). For otherworkthatbegins to address the specific problem of gender and
translation,see also the special issue ofTranslation Review on women in translation,
no. 17 (1985); and Ronald Christ,"The Translator'sVoice: An Interview with Helen
R. Lane," Translation Review, no. 5 (1980), 6-17.

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