Archive of Recent Events
(for detailed reports and more photos of individual events, please see our annual Newsletters)
'Illustrating Dante' with artist Liam Ó Broin: 100 lithographs
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Polish Book Club
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World Fiction Book Club: Kibogo
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Dante's Paradiso
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Taiwan in Translation: an exhibition, film screening and talk
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Poetry in Translation: a workshop with Keith Payne, organised by JoLT
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Translation Masterclasses, Spring 2024This Spring, we hosted a series of literary translation masterclasses. Each masterclass took place here here at the Centre, as a hands-on experience where participants worked together on the translation of a particular form of literature. These masterclasses were designed for practicing translators and other linguists wishing to develop their skills in translating specific literary forms.
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Polish Book Club
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Murakami Book Club
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Book Club (translated literature):The Living and the Rest
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Polish Book Club
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Murakami Book Club
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Book Club: Crooked Plow
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Film: The Story of One Crime
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Celebrating Vasyl Stus: a Poetry Reading in Ukrainian and English
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Taiwan/Ireland Poetry Translation Competition 2023
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Murakami Reading Group: A Wild Sheep Chase
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Writer Petra Hůlová and translator Alex Zucker in conversation
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Polish Book Club
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Book Club: Standing Heavy
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Murakami Reading Group: Pinball, 1973
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Book Club: Em
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Book launch: Without Waking Up
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ISLA Literary Festival
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26 September 2023
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19 September 2023
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Summer 2023: Taiwan/Ireland Poetry Translation Competition
Once the competition closes, winning entries will be chosen by a panel of language and poetry experts. A set of winners will then join us for an online event to discuss the translation of this poem in December 2023. The closing date for this competition was 1st September 2023. To enter, please follow this link: https://forms.gle/UCvLexn3ThCW5as99 |
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Italo Calvino and World Culture |
The Italian Cultural Institute in Dublin, Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation and the Department of Italian at Trinity College Dublin hosted an international conference, Italo Calvino and World Culture: A Hundred-Year Legacy, at Trinity Long Room Hub and the Italian Cultural Institute. The conference, celebrating the life and work of Italo Calvino (1923-1985) on the centenary of his birth, highlighted the legacy of Calvino’s work on world culture, across cultures, disciplines and media. In addition to scholarly talks by distinguished international speakers, the conference featured special events with translator Ann Goldstein, actress Cloris Brosca, writers Domenico Scarpa and Silvio Perrella, and film director Valerio Mieli. Italo Calvino and World Culture: A Hundred-Year Legacy was dedicated to the memory of Calvino scholar and Fellow Emeritus of Trinity College Roberto Bertoni (1952-2019). It was generously sponsored by the Italian Cultural Institute in Dublin, the Faculty of Arts and Humanities and Social Sciences at Trinity College Dublin, and the Society for Italian Studies (SIS). |
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Origins |
Representation of Origins in Enlightenment ThoughtThis conference was organised by Dr James Hanrahan of the French Department at Trinity College Dublin. |
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Summer Translation Workshops
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Literature Ireland invited literary translators working from English into Czech, Dutch, French or Italian to join a series of workshops on translating Irish literature. Participants had the opportunity to fine-tune their skills with expert tutors, and to network and work collectively with fellow literary translators in a friendly and stimulating environment. The workshops offered 20 hours of intensive literary translation training in the genres of fiction, poetry and non-fiction. Three evening guest lectures focussed on broad skills and themes associated with translating Irish literature and Hiberno-English. The 2023 tutors were:
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8 June 2023 |
The Penguin Book of Korean Short StoriesEditor Bruce Fulton, Young-Min Bin Chair in Korean Literature and Literary Translation at the University of British Colombia, joined us for the launch of this essential introduction to Korean literature. Journeying through Korea's dramatic recent past, from the Japanese occupation and colonial era to the devastating war between north and south and the rapid, disorienting urbanisation of later decades, The Penguin Book of Korean Short Stories captures a hundred years of vivid storytelling. |
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16 May 2023 |
Book club: Rodaan Al GalidiOur final book club choice this term was The Leash and the Ball by Rodaan Al Galidi, translated from the Dutch by Jonathan Reeder. |
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27 April 2023 L-R: Olha Matso, Ema Vyroubalova |
Poetry Day Ireland:
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18 April 2023 |
New Fiction by Afghan WomenOur book club met to discuss My Pen is the Wing of a Bird, a collection of new fiction by Afghan women, translated from Pashto and Dari by several translators. |
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29 March 2023 |
'The Bloody Sonnets' by Hviezdoslav:
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21 March 2023 |
Book club meeting: Magda SzabóOur book club met to discuss Abigail by by Magda Szabó, translated from the Hungarian by Len Rix. |
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 Marine biologists and conservationists, whale watchers, translation researchers, artists, musicians, filmmakers were invited to join us for an event exploring what a posthuman ethics of translation and representation could look like for dolphin and whale (cetacean) communication in arts and music.The talk was given by Dr Şebnem Susam-Saraeva, Senior Lecturer in Translation Studies, University of Edinburgh, and was followed by group work among the participants, facilitated by the speaker, to explore alternatives and possibilities of representation that could go beyond victimising, anthropomorphising or exoticising the cetaceans, and to strengthen the links between scientific research in the field with artistic endeavours. You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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Animating Murakami's Blind Willow, Sleeping WomanDirector Pierre Földes was at the Centre for a conversation with Murakami literature specialist, Dr Motoko Akashi, about his work adapting Haruki Murakami's short stories - specifically Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman - into an animated feature film. After the talk, Pierre Földes attended a screening Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman at the Lighthouse cinema in Dublin. |
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Protecting Translators and Interpreters in High Risk Settings: an interview with Maya Hess, founder of Red TMaya Hess is the founder and CEO of Red T, a non-profit organisation that advocates worldwide on behalf of translators and interpreters in high-risk settings. As a court-appointed forensic linguist, she has provided language support and expert witness services in many high-profile terrorism trials, experiencing firsthand just how vulnerable members of her profession can be. She holds a doctorate in criminal justice, a master's in journalism, and an advanced certificate in terrorism studies. Maya Hess gave a compelling talk about the work of Red T. After the event, she was conferred with Honorary Membership of the Irish Translators' and Interpreters' Association (ITIA), an award made to individuals who have made a substantial contribution to the field of translation and interpreting around the world. |
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21 February 2023 |
First Person SingularOur book club met to discuss First Person Singular by Haruki Murakami, translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel. |
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2 December 2022
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2022 Taiwanese Poetry TranslationThe winners of the 2022 Taiwanese Poetry Translation competition joined us for a discussion about their work. Last summer, we held a translation competition for the poem 掠百年的埕過 [Through Centenary Square] by award-winning Taiwanese poet, Tēnn Sūn-tshong (鄭順聰). Translators were asked to render the poem from Taiwanese into English. A panel of judges, including poets, literary translators and language experts, assessed the submissions, and picked the three leading translations. At this event, the three leading translators discussed their approaches to translating the poem and the challenges and issues associated with translating this poem into English. The event started with a reading of the poem in Taiwanese by the poet. |
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24 November 2022 |
Dubliners in TaiwaneseScholar and translator Lâu Îng-sîng came to the Centre for a discussion about his new translation of James Joyce's Dubliners into Taiwanese, a first. |
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24 November 2022 |
Translation and TranslanguagingAt our 6th seminar to mark the 10th anniversary of the Routledge series New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies, editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Tong King Lee and Mike Baynham about their book, Translation and Translanguaging (Routledge 2019). A recording of this seminar may be viewed here. |
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23 November 2022 |
Launch of the English translation of 'Kytice'First published in 1853, this much-loved book of poems by KJ Erben has now been translated into English by Susan Reynolds. Bouquet is a collection of Czech folk tales written in verse form and which were long considered untranslatable. The English translation is beautifully illustrated by Míla Fürstová. Susan Reynolds and Míla Fürstová gave a fascinating talk about their work on the translation and illustration of 'Bouquet'. |
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15 November 2022 |
The Copenhagen TrilogyAt our final book club meeting this term, we met to discuss Childhood, Youth, Dependency (The Copenhagen Trilogy) by Tove Ditlevesen, translated from the Danish by Tiina Nunnally and Michael Favala Goldman. |
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10 November 2022
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Interview with DM SpitzerOur PhD candidate, Andrea Bergantino, interviewed David Spitzer, co-editor of Transfiction and Bordering Approaches to Theorising Translation by David M Spitzer and Paulo Oliveira. This collection of essays builds on themes in the pioneering work of Rosemary Arrojo. |
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3 November 2022 |
Launch of the French translation of Neil Hegarty's novel, Inch LevelsIn 2020, Mona de Pracontal spent 6 weeks at Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation. Mona was our first Visiting French Translation Fellow. During her time here, Mona worked on her translation of the novel Inch Levels by Neil Hegarty. Mona's translation, La Surface de l'eau has now been published in Paris, and we were delighted to welcome Neil and Mona back to the Centre to launch this translation. |
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27 October 2022 |
Journal LaunchWe hosted the launch of a new, independent, literary and visual-arts journal. Dedicated to character-driven writing and portraiture, its aim is to highlight the work of authors, translators and artists. Profiles plans to publish both fiction and non-fiction, as well as visual art across a range of media, from painting to photography. |
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19 October 2022
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Routledge seminar series: Siri NergaardAt our 5th seminar to mark the 10th anniversary of the Routledge series New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies, editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Siri Nergaard about her book Translation and Transmigration (Routledge 2021). |
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18 October 2022 |
Our book club met to discuss Jasmine Days by Benyāmin |
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XI ISLA |
Irish Spanish Latin American Literary FestivalWe co-hosted this year's Irish, Spanish, Latin American Literary Festival with Instituto Cervantes Dublin. The festival included a number of events of particular interest to literary translators, with guests including John Banville, Frank Wynne and Nuria Barrios. |
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6 October 2022The Crane: Selected Poems (Yau Noi)
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Tuesday |
Translating Poetry to and from Nepali
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Sally Rooney in TranslationThursday |
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Routledge seminar series: Moira InghilleriWe are celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Routledge Series 'New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies' with a number of lunchtime seminars with the eminent translation scholars who have published books in this series. At the fourth of these seminars, editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Moira Inghilleri about her book Translation and Migration (Routledge 2017). |
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20 September 2022 |
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At the third of our seminars to mark the 10th anniversary of the Routledge Series 'New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies', editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Federico Italiano about his book Translation and Geography (Routledge 2016). Federico Italiano is Senior Researcher at the Austrian Academy of Sciences and he teaches Comparative Literature at LMU Munich and at the University of Innsbruck. You can watch a recording of this seminar here. |
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Translating Irish theatre for the Brazilian stageTranslating for the stage requires not only linguistic and cultural knowledge, but also a mastery of performance. Having translated over twenty plays, Brazilian actor and translator Clara Carvalho has a deep understanding of the challenges posed by translating for the theatre. Clara shared her experience as the translator and protagonist of Bernard Shaw's play Mrs. Warren's Profession in an online interview with our Ph.D candidate Nayara Güércio. The Brazilian adaptation of Shaw's work was conceived by Dr. Rosalie Rahal Haddad of the Haddad Fellowship, which has generously funded Nayara's PhD research. Rosalie also acted as the play's advisor, instructing and guiding the actors on linguistic and cultural aspects. |
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19 May 2022
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To mark the 10th anniversary of the Routledge Series 'New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies' we are running a number of monthly lunchtime seminars to celebrate the work of the eminent translation scholars who have published books in this series. At the second of these seminars, editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Brian James Baer, Professor of Russian and Translation Studies at Kent State University, Ohio, and author of Queer Theory and Translation Studies: Language, Politics, Desire. You can watch a recording of this seminar here. |
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17 May 2022 |
TCLCT Book ClubOur book club met to discuss Grey Bees by Ukrainian writer Andrey Kurkov, translated from the Russian by Boris Dralyuk. Kurkov. |
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Poet Gerry Murphy in a new German translationGerry Murphy, 'Cork's uncrowned poet laureate', and his German translator, Jürgen Schneider, were at the Centre for the launch of the translation of Murphy's Setting the Globe in Motion (Den Globus in Bewegung setzen). The poems were selected and translated by Schneider and the book was illustrated by the late Belfast artist Micky Donnelly. A recording of this event is available to view here. |
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Conference:
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Who's Afraid of Translator Studies? The Human Translator in FocusOur postgraduate researchers and early career researchers hosted a day and a half of presentations on the theme of the human translator. You can contact this group at tclctphd@gmail.com and follow them on Twitter @TCLCTPhDs
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22 April 2022
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Society of Swedish Literature in FinlandWe were delighted to welcome a delegation from the Society of Swedish Literature in Finland, a scholarly society founded in 1885. The society’s mission is the preservation, development and dissemination of knowledge about the Swedish culture and cultural heritage in Finland, and it works in the fields of literature, history, ethnology, philology and linguistics and social sciences. |
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20 April 2022 |
A Different Eden: Ecopoetry from Ireland and GaliciaOn 20th April, we hosted our first truly hybrid event for the launch of this new book from Dedalus Press. Poets Nidhi Zak/Aria Eipe, Daniel Salgado and co-editor of the collection, Keith Payne, entertained us with readings of a selection of the poems which were orginally written in Galician, English or Irish, and then translated. You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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April 2022 |
Book club: translated fiction We met to discuss Waiting for the Waters to Rise, a novel by Maryse Condé set in Guadeloupe, Mali and Haiti. Translated from the French
by Richard Philcox. |
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To mark the 10th anniversary of the Routledge Series 'New Perspectives in Translation and Interpreting Studies' we are running a series of seminars to celebrate the work of the eminent translation scholars who have published books in the series. Titles address contemporary themes and issues that reflect the changing nature of translation and interpreting studies today. With an emphasis on innovative and accessible writing, books in the series are key reading for students, researchers and anyone with a deep interest in translation and interpreting studies. At the first of these seminars, editor Michael Cronin was in conversation with Sherry Simon, Canadian translation scholar and author of Translation Sites: A Field Guide (2019) and Cities in Translation: Intersections of Language and Memory (2012). You can watch a recording of this seminar here. |
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1 April 2022
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In 2018 we invited colleagues from across the island of Ireland to set up a Translation Studies Network of Ireland. The aim of this network is to provide a supportive environment for scholars pursuing research topics in translation studies. Our academic staff and team of PhD candidates travelled to Queen's University Belfast for the network's second annual conference on 1st April. |
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25-26 March 2022 |
We recently joined 'RECIT', a network of European literary translation centres offering residencies for translators and organising public events that bring together writers, translators and their audiences. As the newest member of this network, we were very pleased to have been invited to host RECIT's 2022 General Assembly here at Trinity College Dublin. |
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15 March 2022 |
Book club: translated fictionWe met to discuss The Fig Tree by Goran Vojnović |
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2 March 2022
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The Foreign Connection:
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15 February 2022 |
Book club: translated fictionOur book club met to discuss Winter in Sokcho by French-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins. |
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15 December 2021 |
Translating the poetry of Tsao Yu-PoLast Summer we held a translation competition for a new poem, Night's Amnesty by award-winning Taiwanese poet, Tsao Yu-po. Translators were asked to translate this poem from Mandarin into English and the three leading translators took part in a roundtable discussion about their translations. The recording is available to view here. |
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9 December 2021
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Ocean: a conversation with Canadian poet Sue Goyette and her translator, Georgette LeBlancIn Ireland as in eastern Canada, the Atlantic Ocean shapes our lives and imaginations. Sue Goyette captures these complexities in Ocean, her Griffin poetry prize-shortlisted collection, part biography of the ocean and part history of our relationship to it. Franco-Canadian poet and translator Georgette LeBlanc won the '2020 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation' for her translation of this collection. Sue Goyette and Georgette LeBlanc joined Danielle LeBlanc, a PhD candidate at Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation, for an in-depth discussion of this work. You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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17 November 2021
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Jofroi de Waterford: a translator in medieval IrelandJofroi de Waterford, a brother of the Dominican house of St Saviour’s in Waterford, was a scholar in the late 13th-early 14th century who translated key Latin works into French: some of these texts were widely read in Western Europe in the late Middle Ages. Ca. 1300, Jofroi translated and adapted from the Latin three texts: the De excidio Troiae of the so-called ‘Dares Phrygius’; the Breviarium historiae romanae of Eutropius; and the Pseudo-Aristotelian Secretum secretorum. These translations are key witness to the importance of French as a literary language in south-eastern Ireland at the time. Our guest, Keith Busby, is Douglas Kelly Professor of Medieval French Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America. At the time of this talk, he was a Visiting Research Fellow at Trinity Long Room Hub. Professor Busby discussed translation issues and procedures in Jofroi's work. You can listen to the recording of this event here. |
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16 November 2021 |
Book club: translated fictionOur book club met to discuss The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar, translated from the Farsi by Anonymous. Shortlisted for the 2020 International Booker Prize, this award-winning novel is set in Iran in the decade following the 1979 Islamic Revolution. |
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10 November 2021
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New Irish translation of Embers by Sándor MáraiTranslator Irene Duffy Lynch was at the Centre to launch her translation into Irish of Embers by Hungarian novelist Sándor Márai, 'Loisceann na Coinnle go dtí an tÓrlach'. Irene was in conversation with Mícheál Mac Craith and Séamus Mac Gabhann. Written in 1942, Embers (A gyertyák csonkig égnek) was first translated into English in 2001 and became an international bestseller. Having been forgotten for many years, the novel is now considered a classic of modern European literature. You can watch a recording of this event here |
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Petra-E Literary Translation Studies Conference 2021We were delighted to host PETRA-E's first ever conference "Literary Translation Studies Today and Tomorrow". PETRA-E* is a network which aims to strengthen a European infrastructure for the education and training of literary translators. Members include Fondazione Unicampus San Pellegrino, KU Leuven, ELTE Hungary, Utrecht University, Taalunie, ELV, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, CEATL, British Centre for Literary Translation, Jagiellonian University of Krakow, Pazmany Peter Catholic University Budapest, University of Salamanca, University of Vienna, Ghent University, Sorbonne Nouvelle, University of Belgrade, Wroclawski Unviersity, the University of Zadar and Trinity College Dublin. |
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20 October 2021
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Trinity in TranslationTrinity alumna Dr Carol O’Sullivan, Associate Professor of Translation Studies at the University of Bristol, was in conversation with Professor Michael Cronin about the fascinating history of translation and translated literature by scholars and former students of Trinity College Dublin. This talk was part of the Inspiring Ideas @ Trinity webinar series, hosted by Trinity Development & Alumni. You can watch the recording here
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19 October 2021 |
Book clubOur book club met to discuss The Perfect Nine: the Epic of Gĩkũyũ and Mũmbi by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. Longlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize, this epic tale from Kenya was translated from the Gikuyu by the author. |
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30 September 2021
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European Day of Languages with Colm TóibínWe were delighted to welcome Colm Tóibín and his French, Greek and Polish translators, Anna Gibson, Athina Dimitriadou and Jerzy Kozłowski for a wonderful evening discussing Tóibín's work, including his new novel The Magician. This event was held on International Translation Day and also marked European Day of Languges, and was organised in partnership with the French, Greek and Polish embassies in Ireland and with EUNIC-Ireland (EU National Institutes for Culture). You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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21 September 2021
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Book club resumesOur translated fiction book club met to discuss At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop, translated from the French by Anna Moschovakis. Among many other awards, this book won the 2021 International Booker Prize. |
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9 June 2021
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'Wolves at the Door: Migration, Dehumanization, Rewilding the World'Situated at the junction of literature, politics and ecocriticism, this new book by Peter Arnds, Wolves at the Door, traces the history of the wolf metaphor in discussions of race, gender, colonialism, fascism, and ecology. How have 'Gypsies', Jews, Native Americans but also 'wayward' women been 'wolfed' in literature and politics? How has the wolf myth been exploited by Hitler, Mussolini and Turkish ultra-nationalism? How do right-wing politicians today exploit the reappearance of wolves in Central Europe in the context of the migration discourse? And while their reintroduction in places like Yellowstone has fuelled heated debates, what is the wolf's role in ecological rewilding and for the restoration of biodiversity? Professpr Peter Arnds, director of the MPhil in Comparative Literature at Trinity College Dublin, was in conversation with DrNicole Basaraba, Postdoctoral Researcher at Maastricht University. A recording of this event is available to watch here. |
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18 May 2021 |
BookclubAt our final bookclub this term, we discussed Three Apples Fell from the Sky by Narine Abgaryan, set in Armenia and translated from the Russian by Lisa C. Hayden. |
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Mícheál Ó hAodha in ConversationMícheál Ó hAodha is an acclaimed poet and translator from Galway in the west of Ireland who writes in the Irish language. He has written poetry, short stories, journalism and academic books on Irish social history, particularly relating to Travellers, the Irish working-class experience, and the Irish who emigrated to Britain. He is one of the few Irish-language poets since Seán Ó Ríordáin to explore the metaphysical in the Irish language, his work encompassing themes of loss, longing, memory, love and forgetting - in collections such as Leabhar na nAistear (The Book of Journeys) and Leabhar na nAistear II. Mícheál is also an accomplished translator: recent best-selling translations from the Irish include: Seán Ó Ríordáin: Life and Work by Seán Ó Coileán (Mercier Press, 2018); Exiles by Dónall Mac Amhlaigh (Parthian, 2020); and This Road of Mine by Seosamh Mac Griannna (Lilliput, 2020). Mícheál was in conversation about this work with Michael Cronin, Director of Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation. You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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Lawrence Venuti in ConversationLawrence Venuti, professor emeritus of English at Temple University, Philadelphia, is a leading translation theorist and historian. He also translates from Italian, French, and Catalan. He is, most recently, the author of Contra Instrumentalism: A Translation Polemic (2019), the editor of The Translation Studies Reader (4th ed., 2021), and the translator of J.V. Foix’s Daybook 1918: Early Fragments (2019), for which he won the Global Humanities Translation Prize at Northwestern University. His Theses on Translation: An Organon for the Current Moment (2019), is available online at https://flugschriften.com/2019/09/15/thesis-on-translation. Prof. Venuti joined Prof. Michael Cronin, Director of Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation, for a wide-ranging discussion about Venuti's work in the field of translation studies.A recording of this event is available to view here. |
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BookclubOur bookclub met to discuss The Adventures of China Iron by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara translated from the Spanish (Argentina) by Fiona Mackintosh and Iona Macintyre. Shortlisted for the 2020 International Booker prize, this book was described as "a thrilling miniature epic" by The Guardian. |
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Can machines be creative in literary translation?Ana Guerberof-Arenas gave an update on the preliminary findings of the CREAMT project. Funded by the EU's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant, the CREAMT project is led by Ana Guerberof-Arenas and Antonio Toral. The project uses a novel, interdisciplinary approach to assess how effective machine translation (MT) is in literary translation, by focusing on the creative aspect of literary texts and the reader's experience. The first phase analyses reproductions and creative shifts in three modalities: MT, human translation and MT post-editing, and two languages: Catalan and Dutch. The second phase measures the reader’s experience using narrative engagement and enjoyment scales borrowed from psychology, communication and literary studies. Ana Guerberof-Arenas is Senior Lecturer in Translation and Multimodal Technologies at the University of Surrey. She is also a Marie Skłodowska Curie Research Fellow at the University of Groningen for the CREAMT project. She worked for over 20 years in the translation/localization industry, and previously worked as an MSc Research Fellow at the ADAPT Centre in Dublin City University, and as a lecturer at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Ana's research is focused on creativity in translation; translation reception and reading experience with different translation modalities; MT usability; MT post-editing productivity, quality and experience; pre-editing and post-editing; reading comprehension of MT output; and translator training. A recording of Ana's presentation can be viewed here. |
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Translating Great Russian Literature: The Penguin Russian ClassicsCathy McAteer presented her new book, Translating Great Russian Literature, hosted by Conor Daly from the Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies at Trinity College. McAteer's book draws on her doctoral research of the Penguin archive to reveal some of the key publishing and translation practices behind Penguin’s relaunch of the Russian Classics during the mid-twentieth century. She looked at the ways in which Allen Lane, Penguin’s founder, the series editor E.V. Rieu, and a new cohort of commissioned translators (Gilbert Gardiner, Elisaveta Fen, David Magarshack, and Rosemary Edmonds) brought classic Russian authors - including Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Pushkin, Gogol, Lermontov and more - to post-war readers, and subsequently paved the way for Soviet literature in translation. Cathy McAteer is a Postdoctoral Fellow on the “Dark Side of Translation” project at the University of Exeter. Her main research interests lie in the field of classic Russian literature in English translation during the 20th century, using archival material to shed light on the people and processes behind historical commissions, specifically Penguin’s Russian Classics. Her academic monograph, Translating Great Russian Literature: the Penguin Russian Classics, was published by Routledge as Open Access in 2021. Cathy is currently researching the private, archived papers of twentieth-century female translators of Russian literature as the basis for her next publication. Conor Daly is a Visiting Research Fellow in the Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies at Trinity College Dublin. He has a PhD in Slavic Languages and Literatures from the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests include the historical development of the Russian ‘scholarly style’ and the fate of the Russian language in Alaska. He has worked both as an interpreter and as a translator. His published translations from Russian into English have appeared in The New York Review of Books and Mosaic. Conor is currently teaching Russian translation at Trinity College. |
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25 March 2021 |
Literary Translator StudiesEditors Klaus Kaindl, Waltraud Kolb and Daniela Schlager, of the University of Vienna's Centre for Translation Studies, joined us for a discussion about their new book, Literary Translator Studies. The emerging field of literary translator studies firmly positions the literary translator as a subject of research. The editors discussed how we can study the roles, identities and personalities of literary translators as human beings rather than disembodied channels of communication. They also presented some outstanding individuals, some of them long-forgotten literary translators, others well-known figures who appear in a new light. You can view a recording of this event here.
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16 March 2021 |
Bookclub
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18 February 2021 |
Encounters in Greek and Irish LiteratureEditor Paschalis Nikolaou of the Ionian University Corfu, and writer Deirdre Madden of Trinity College Dublin joined us for a discussion about Nikolaou's most recent book, Encounters in Greek and Irish Literature, which explores interactions between these two linguistic and cultural traditions, as well as the role that translation plays as an integral part of this dialogue. Paschalis Nikolaou is Assistant Professor in Literary Translation at the Ionian University. Deirdre Madden has published nine novels and three novels for children, and her work has been translated into several languages. Deirdre teaches Creative Writing on the MPhil programme at Trinity's Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing. You can see a recording of this event here. |
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16 February 2021 |
Family Lexicon by Natalia GinzburgOur book club reviewed Family Lexicon by Natalia Ginzburg in its new (2018) translation from the Italian by Jenny McPhee. The book was introduced by Prof. Cormac Ó Cuilleanáin, translator, writer and former Head of Italian at Trinity College Dublin, and we were also joined by Jenny McPhee. Jenny is a widely-published novelist and translator: in addition to books by Natalia Ginzburg, she has translated works by Primo Levi, Anna Maria Ortese, Curzio Malaparte, Paolo Maurensig, and Pope John Paul II. An administrator and faculty member at NYU, she has taught at Princeton and the European School of Literary Translation. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2020.You can watch a recording of this event here. |
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11 February 2021
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A Gap in the Clouds:
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26 November 2020
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Misha Hoekstra |
Ed Barger |
Award-winning translator Misha Hoekstra joined us for a lunchtime reading and discussion about his latest translation from Danish, New Passengers by Tine Høeg. The talk was moderated by translator Jordan Barger.
Tine Høeg is a Danish writer and Misha's translation of her novel New Passengers was published in September 2020 by Lolli Editions. The novel won an English Pen Award and the Bogforum’s Debutantpris which is awarded each year for the best literary debut published in Denmark.
Misha Hoekstra has translated numerous Danish authors, including Hans Christian Andersen and Maren Uthaug. In 2017, he received the Danish Translation Prize, and his translation of Dorthe Nors’s Mirror, Shoulder, Signal was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize.
“A brilliantly original novel in verse, New Passengers tells the story, taut and well-crafted, of a young woman’s disorientation and search for her adult self. In his masterful translation, Misha Hoekstra has captured the complex shifts and nuances of Tine Høeg’s unique poetic style, her sense of timing, and her humour, bringing to English one of Denmark’s most compelling new voices.” – PEN America
19 November 2020
Translating Shakespeare into Japanese
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Prof. Daniel Gallimore gave a fascinating talk about Shoyo's work translating Shakespeare into Japanese
Tsubouchi Shoyo (1859-1935), usually known by his pen name Shoyo, was a distinguished playwright, novelist, critic and translator. He was the first person to translate the complete works of William Shakespeare into Japanese. When he was born at the end of the Edo era (1603-1868, the period of national isolation), Dutch – not English – was still the main language of communication with the outside world, and the national language divided hierarchically between the classical written style of an educated elite and the range of dialects spoken by the majority. Shoyo’s Shakespeare translations, which were published as bestsellers in the 1910s and 1920s, exemplify the remarkable unification of the spoken and written styles achieved over his lifetime, not to mention the growth in higher education as Japan sought its place in the modern world.
Daniel Gallimore is Professor of English at Kwansei Gakuin University, Japan, and specialises in teaching Shakespeare. He received his doctorate from Linacre College, Oxford University, in 2001 for a thesis on the treatment of prosody in Japanese translations of A Midsummer Night’s Dream (published by Kwansei Gakuin University Press in 2012). He has been learning Japanese since 1987, and is an active translator of contemporary Japanese drama and Japanese Shakespeare adaptations.
17 November 2020
Bookclub
The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld,
translated from the Dutch by Michele Hutchinson.
20 October 2020
Bookclub
Our book club met on 20 October to discuss Disoriental by Négar Djavadi. We were delighted to be joined by Tina Kover, who translated the book from the French.
25 September 2020
Edna O'Brien in Translation
Photo: Guardian News and Media Ltd. 2015
On 25 September 2020, we marked European Day of Languages with an event celebrating the work of Edna O’Brien in translation. We were joined by Edna O'Brien who spoke eloquently about the 'noble act' of translation and her on-going debt to her many translators, as well as reading an excerpt from her most recent novel, Girl.
Translators Kathrin Razum, Giovanna Granato and Ana Mata Buil took part in a discussion about the challenges they faced translating Girl, into German, Italian and Spanish respectively. We were also joined by Sabine Wespieser, Edna O'Brien's long time French publisher. Sabine was representing French translators, Aude de Saint-Loup and Pierre-Emmanuel Dauzat who were unable to attend. The event was moderated by Dr Rosie Lavan of Trinity's School of English.
This event was kindly supported by EUNIC (EU National Institutes for Culture), the Embassy of France in Ireland, Alliance Française Dublin, Instituto Cervantes Dublin, the Austrian Embassy Dublin, the Embassy of Switzerland in Ireland, Istituto Italiano di Cultura Dublin and the Goethe-Insitut Ireland. To watch a recording of this event, please click here
1 July 2020
Peter Torberg: a literary translator in conversation
In 2020 Peter Torberg was awarded a translation residency by Literature Ireland and Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation. Due to Covid-19, Peter's residency had to be postponed, so we were delighted that he was able to join us for a webinar with Prof. Michael Cronin to discuss his long career as a translator and his approach to literary translation across a huge range of literary genres.
Peter Torberg has an outstanding track record of translating literary works from English into German: he has translated hundreds of novels, short stories, essays, poems, radio plays, audio books, theatre plays and film scripts. Writers whose work he has translated include Paul Auster, Larry Beinhart, Michael Caine, Peter Carey, Jerom Charyn, Anita Desai, Garry Disher, Raymond Federman, William Golding, Christopher Hitchens, Rudyard Kipling, Deirdre Madden, Conor McPherson, Michael Ondaatje, David Peace, Richard Price, Ishmael Reed, Jim Thompson, Mark Twain, Eliot Weinberger, Irvine Welsh, Oscar Wilde, Tad Williams, Daniel Woodrell, and Bob Woodward.
You can watch a recording of this event here
10 June 2020
A Conversation with John Banville
John Banville is one of Ireland's greatest living writers. He has published 17 novels and has been awarded many prestigious literary prizes, including the Man Booker Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, the Guardian Fiction Award, the Franz Kafka Prize, a Lannan Literary Award for Fiction and the Prince of Asturias Award for Literature.
On 10 June, he spoke with Prof. Michael Cronin: to listen to a recording of this event, click here
19 May 2020
Writer, scholar and translator Alan Titley in conversation
Special guest Prof. Alan Titley was interviewed by Prof. Michael Cronin for our Book club about his translation of the darkly comic novella The Dregs of the Day by Máirtín Ó Cadhain (Yale University Press, 2019).
Published just months before he died in 1970, Máirtín Ó Cadhain's novella follows the story of a nameless civil servant, N., in the days immediately following the death of his wife. N. is a lost soul on a hopeless quest for salvation: he hates his job, his wife’s family and trusts no one and, in a cloud of grief, he wanders the streets in a futile search for salvation. The Dregs of the Day is a darkly humorous look at the widower’s attempts to arrange his wife’s funeral without money, a plan or anyone to turn to. With black humour sprinkled throughout, the book illustrates Ó Cadhain’s conviction that tragedy and comedy are inextricably linked.
Alan Titley's new translation brings this work to an English-speaking audience for the first time, beautifully capturing the despair and humour of the original. Alan Titley is the acclaimed translator of Ó Cadhain’s masterpiece, Cré na Cille (The Dirty Dust) which for many years was considered untranslatable.
To watch a recording of this event, click here
21 April 2020
Our monthly book club went online for the first time ever, to discuss the multi-award winning novel Go Went Gone by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated from German by Susan Bernofsky.
27 March 2020
Translating Chinese Film Titles - postponed
As part of the 4th East Asia Film Festival Ireland (EAFFI) we planned to host a talk about the challenges of translating film titles. Translating film titles from Chinese into English is never straightforward and there are many challenges posed by cultural and linguistic differences.
We look forward to welcoming experts Dr Qi Zhang, assistant professor at the School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies, Dublin City University, and Dr Caitríona Osborne, assistant professor in the Irish Institute for Chinese Studies, University College Dublin to the Centre at a future date.
19 March 2020
An evening with Irish writer Neil Hegarty and his French translator, Mona de Pracontal - postponed until further notice
Mona de Pracontal is the inaugural French Visiting Translation Fellow at Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation and she is currently working on her translation of Neil's debut novel, Inch Levels, into French. This book was shortlisted for the Kerry Group novel of the year award.
Inch Levels is a complex novel about loss, remorse, violence and secrecy, set over a 50 year year period in rural Ireland. The tense onset of the Troubles and bombs becoming a part of daily life are set against the wild beauty of the Donegal and Derry landscapes. How does a translator approach these themes of local landscape and history? Every book has its own challenges for a translator, and Mona will discuss these with Neil – possibly starting with whether or how she will translate the book’s title!
Mona's residency was generously sponsored by the Embassy of France in Dublin and Alliance Française Dublin. Her translation will be published by Joëlle Losfeld at Gallimard.
4 March 2020
Writer Conor O'Callaghan and translator Mona de Pracontal met to discuss Mona's award-winning translation of Conor's novel Nothing on Earth (Rien d'autre sur terre - Sabine Wespieser Éditeur). This event was held at the Alliance Française Dublin, and was moderated by Dr Kevin Power.
24 February 2020: Translating Donal Ryan: Voices in German
L-R Rachel McNicholl, Donal Ryan, Anna-Nina Kroll
Anna-Nina Kroll was the 2020 Translator-in-Residence at Literature Ireland and the Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation. Irish writer Donal Ryan was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2013, and won the Guardian First Book award the same year. Anna-Nina has translated all of his work to date into German and she is currently working on her translation of From a Low and Quiet Sea. Our moderator for this very entertaining evening was literary translator Rachel McNicholl.
18 February 2020
The Book Club met to discuss Black Moses by Alain Mabanckou,
translated from French
(Congo) by Helen Stevenson.
12 February 2020
On Translating Juan Rulfo
Juan Rulfo (1917-1986) was a Mexican novelist and short story writer, whose work had a profound influence on his contemporaries, including García Márquez. His remarkable short story collection El Llano en llamas (1953) centres on life in rural Mexico after the revolution.
Translator Stephen Beechinor came to the Centre to discuss his new translation of El Llano in flames with Professor Michael Cronin. They discussed Rulfo’s influence as a writer, the motives and aims of this translation, the first complete translation into English outside the US, some translation issues and stylistic choices, the editorial process and small press publication.
Stephen Beechinor is a graduate of UCC and Trinity College. He translates from French, Spanish and Catalan. This is Stephen’s first book-length translation and it has been long-listed for the 2020 Republic of Consciousness Prize.
L-R: H.E. Miguel Malfavón Andrade, Mexican Ambassador to Ireland; Stephen Beechinor, translator; Tania Mendoza, School of Languages, Literatures and Cultural Studies; Prof. Michael Cronin.
5 February 2020
French Visiting Translator Fellowship at Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation
Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation, the French Embassy in Ireland and Alliance Française Dublin celebrated the launch of a new French Visiting Translator Fellowship. The purpose of this fellowship is to bring translators to Ireland who are translating Irish literature into French.
The inaugural French Visiting Translator Fellow is Mona de Pracontal. During her eight-week residency at Trinity College, Mona will be translating Inch Levels by Neil Hegarty, and her translation will be published by Joëlle Losfeld, Gallimard.
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L-R: Lionel Paradisi-Coulouma, Deputy Head of Mission at the French Embassy in Ireland; Patrick Prendergast, Provost of Trinity College; Mona de Pracontal, translator; Prof. Michael Cronin, Director of Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation.
16 January 2020
Literature Ireland hosted an evening at the Centre with writer Sara Baume in conversation with her French translator, France Camus-Pichon.
France Camus-Pichon's translation of Sara's first novel, Spill Simmer Falter Wither' (Dans la baie fauve) won the Prix littéraire des Ambassadeurs de la Francophonie 2019. France is currently translating Sara's second novel, A Line Made By Walking.
18 October 2019
Conference: The Future of Translation in Ireland
Trinity Long Room Hub
We hosted host the first annual conference of the Translation Studies Network of Ireland (TSNI). The TSNI is a network of scholars from across the island of Ireland who have an interest in the study of translation.
Translation has been practised on the island of Ireland for more than a thousand years. Successive phases of Irish history have seen translation play a crucial role in our cultural, political and economic development. Translation has been a key factor in the interaction over the centuries between the different languages spoken on the island. In recent decades, Translation Studies has gained a strong institutional presence in higher education in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. There is a growing body of scholarship on translation being produced by researchers working in Ireland. This scholarship is enriched by the work of scholars around the world who have taken an interest in the role translation has played in the development of culture and society in Ireland. This conference will explore the diversity of translation research in Ireland and examine the scope for future research.
To see the full Conference Programme, click here.
15 October 2019
The Book Club met to review Death is Hard Work by Khaled Khalifa,
translated from the Arabic (Syria) by Leri Price.
26 September 2019
Trinity College Exam Hall
Terry Pratchett was a prolific write and satirist, who wrote over 55 books and his work has been translated into 34 languages. All of these translations and many originals are held in the Trinity College Library collection - about 667,800 pages of text in all.
To celebrate European Day of Languages, we spent an evening looking at how Terry Pratchett's famous Discworld novels have been translated. The event focused on the theme of humour, jokes and wordplay, with particular reference to Pyramids.
We were joined by some of Pratchett's translators, to discuss how each of them tackled the same challenges in their own languages: Patrick Couton (French), Anikó Sohár (Hungarian), Piotr W. Cholewa (Polish) and Mariá Ferrer (Spanish).
21 September 2019
Terry Pratchett 'Hackathon',
Trinity Long Room Hub
The Pratchett Project team at Trinity College organised a 'hackathon' to get fans of Terry Pratchett involved in our research.
Fans were invited to bring their laptops to Trinity to tackle some quantitative research on the publication history of Pratchett's work around the world. Trinity has a huge collection of Pratchett's work, in English and in translation. We hope to digitise the entire collection, so that researchers can come along and see how syntax and verbs change in the different languages and how the books differ from country to country. At this event, we looked at Trinity's collection, and also at sister collections held by the University of London's Senate House Library and Liverpool University.
A highlight of the day was an interview with a very special guest who worked closely with Pratchett during his life, Terry's literary agent, Colin Smythe.
20 September 2019 (Culture Night), Trinity Long Room Hub
Terry Pratchett at the Unseen University
For the second year running, we celebrated Trinity's special relationship with fantasy author, Terry Pratchett. We looked at our world-leading collection of Pratchett materials and how how we are using cutting-edge techniques to analyse Pratchett's life and work. Researchers from across College came together to create an interactive event, celebrating Pratchett’s life, work, and his close connections with Trinity. Work on our huge Pratchett collection covers everything from translation studies and technology to writing for children.
17 September 2019
Book Club
Celestial Bodies by Jokha Alharthi, translated from the Arabic (Oman) by Marilyn Booth.
26 June 2019, Nigerian Royal Visit
The monarch of the Yoruba kingdom, His Imperial Majesty The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, Ojaja II, and his royal entourage paid a courtesy call to the Centre, during a recent visit to Ireland.
Accompanied by the Ambassador of Nigeria to Ireland, H.E. Dr. Uzoma Emenike, discussions explored how the Centre might develop educational and cultural collaborations with universities and cultural organisations in Nigeria. His Imperial Majesty spoke of his great interest in language and culture and expressed his wish that the relationship between Trinity and Nigerian universities might be further developed.
18 June 2019, On Translating Dante
A roundtable with Prof. Robin Kirkpatrick (University of Cambridge) Prof. Cormac Ó Cuilleanáin and Prof. Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin (both of Trinity College Dublin). Robin Kirkpatrick is Professor of Italian and English Literature at the University of Cambridge and he has written a number of books on Dante and on the Renaissance. His verse translation of the Commedia with notes and commentary was published by Penguin Classics in 2006-7. We were delighted to host this event which was part of the first of three Dante Summer Schools which will run in June 2019, June 2020 and June 2021, organised by Trinity's Department of Italian, UCD and the Istituto Italiano di Culturo. This year's theme was Dante’s Inferno: The Medieval Text and its Afterlife.
18 June 2019, Book Club
My Cat Yugoslavia, by Pajtim Statovci
Translated from the Finnish by David Hackston
On 23 and 24 May 2019 we hosted the following events organised by Literature Ireland, as part of the International Dublin Literature Festival
Friday 24 May
Europe Meets South America: Juan Gabriel Vásquez & Samanta Schweblin
Some political realities seem harder than others to communicate to those who have no direct experience of them. Juan Gabriel Vásquez and Samanta Schweblin explored with Daniel Hahn the role of translation in communicating such different realities to the reader.
Friday, 24 May
Sea Chests from across the World, or a Globalised Literary Landscape?
Literature in translation introduces a wide variety of new writers into different cultures. At a time when many fear the negative effects of globalisation, can literature from other corners of the world bring fresh perspectives? Writers Alejandro Zambra and Ariana Harwicz, publisher Sam McDowell (Charco Press) and Carolina Orloff, with Jean-Philippe Imbert.
Friday, 24 May
East–West Cultural Exchange: Joy or Scourge?
Japanese writing is gaining in international profile, and many European authors are gaining a following in Japan. Translator Polly Barton, translator-in-residence Hiroko Mikami and writer Tomoka Shibasaki discussed the barriers and opportunities for cultural exchange with James Hadley.
Thursday 23 May, Trinity Long Room Hub
Ann Goldstein in Conversation with Sinéad Mac Aodha
Ann Goldstein is one of the most celebrated literary translators of our time, with translations ranging from the work of Primo Levi to Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels. She discussed her role as a translator of Italian language and culture, in conversation with Sinéad Mac Aodha of Literature Ireland. International Dublin Literature Festival
Thursday 23 May, Trinity Long Room Hub
Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin: Poetry and Translation
Professor Emeritus of Trinity College Dublin and Ireland Chair of Poetry, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, in conversation with Peter Sirr, explored the importance of poetry in translation today. Why do poets choose to translate each other? Is their creative work then influenced by the act of translation?
Thursday 23 May
Daniel Hahn on translating Julián Fuks
Where facts and fiction collide, how does a translator respect both the author and the reader? Can the translator bridge the cultural divide between author and reader? Writer, editor and translator Daniel Hahn considered these and other questions.
21 May, 2019
Book Club: The Last Children of Tokyo, by Yoko Tawada.
Translated from Japanese by Margaret Mitsutani.
Our book club this month was hosted by our translator-in-residence, Prof Hiroko Mikami.
20 May 2019
The Reception of Bernard Shaw's Plays in Brazil
Dr Rosalie Rahal Haddad is an associate researcher for the William Butler Yeats Chair of Irish Studies at the University of São Paulo, Brazil. She is an honorary adviser and former vice-president of the Associação Brasileira de Estudos Irlandeses. Dr Haddad has written extensively on the plays of George Bernard Shaw and other Irish playwrights. This evening, she talked about the reception of Shaw's plays in Brazil and referenced her own production of Mrs Warren’s Profession, performed in São Paulo in 2018.
Click here to watch an introduction by Prof. Michael Cronin to this event, and click here to watch the full recording.
15 May 2019
Poetry Spring Festival of Lithuania: an evening of contemporary Lithuanian and Irish poetry
The Lithuanian community in Ireland and the Lithuanian Writer‘s Union is held an Irish-Lithuanian poetry reading to mark the Poetry Spring Festival of Lithuania.
Award winning Irish poet, novelist and translator, Peter Sirr, Lithuanian poet and translator, Marius Burokas (Burokas has translated Peter Sirr’s poetry into Lithuanian), and Lithuanian poet, Giedrė Kazlauskaitė, who is one of the leading female voices in contemporary Lithuanian poetry, read from and discussed their work at the Centre.
This event celebrated the work of two important literary translators in contemporary Europe and gave the Irish audience a rare opportunity to hear some of the best contemporary Lithuanian poetry in English translation.
This event was kindly sponsored by the Embassy of Lithuania in Dublin and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Lithuania, Global Lithuania Programme.
9 May 2019 Words on the Street: a European literature trail, May 2019 |
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7 May 2019 A Celebration of Czech literature before and after 1989 Seminar-workshop to consider the significance of literary translation in Czechoslovakia before and after the fall of the communist regime in 1989. Our two guest speakers – accomplished Czech translators Tomáš Vrba and Alice Hyrmanová McElveen – discussed the role translators played in preserving cultural treasures and maintaining the continuity of national literatures. In the 1980s, Tomáš was active in samizdat where, for a time, he co-operated with Václav Havel and his team. Alice lived in exile in England and, among other things, translated prohibited Czech authors whose texts had been smuggled abroad. Their most recent translations include, respectively: Madeleine Albright’s memoir Prague Winter (as Pražská zima, 2018), and Sara Baume’s novel Spill Simmer Falter Wither (as Jasno lepo podstín zhyna, 2016). The second part of our evening comprised a hands-on examination of some specific texts. Our guest speakers will demonstrate what impact the change from communist regime to democracy, which took place almost exactly thirty years ago, has had on their work. This event was kindly supported by the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Dublin. |
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16 April 2019 Book Club, 6:30 pm. Small Country by Gaël Faye, translated from French by Sarah Ardizzone.
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12 April 2019 Evening to celebrate the English translation of Sky Navigation Homeward by Japanese poet, Mikiro Sasaki, published by Daedalus Press. The author, one of his translators, Dr Mitsuko Ohno, and professor of Irish literature and translation, Nobuaki Tochigi, presented a selection of poems in Japanese and in English, and discussed the particular issues relating to translating Japanese poetry into English. |
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11 April 2019 Finnegans Wake at 80, Translation Roundtable, Trinity Long Room Hub Finnegans Wake stands at the limit of translation: written in a Babelian mishmash of eighty languages, it poses practical and theoretical problems for any translator. Indeed, it may even be seen to be about translation. Michael Cronin hosted r a roundtable to discuss these issues with translators Congrong Dai (Chinese), Erik Bindervoet (Dutch), and Enrico Terrinoni (Italian). This event was part of the Finnegans Wake 80 conference at Trinity Long Room Hub from 11–13 April, organised by our colleagues in the School of English. |
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8 April 2019 Narratives of the Spanish Civil War and the Dictatorship Languages play a crucial role in war, conflict and peacemaking. Editors Lucía Pintado Gutiérrez and Alicia Castillo Villanueva launched their book which seeks to establish a new dialogue between translation, conflict and memory studies, focusing on fictional texts, reports from war zones and audiovisual representations of the Spanish civil war and the Franco dictatorship. |
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4 April 2019 Irish and Catalan poetry reading and book launch, 6pm Irish poet Maurice Scully and Catalan poet Jordi Valls Pozo (translated by Raoul Izzard) were at the Centre to discuss their collection of poems, published by HardPressed Poetry. Scully and Valls Pozo read from their work, followed by conversation with them and their editor, poet Catherine Walsh. |
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| Priscila Ribeiro, a recent graduate of our MPhil in Literary Translation, gave a talk about her journey from student life to her current work in computer game translation at Playrix, one of the leading mobile game developers in the world. She discussed what Playrix does and what her role is in the company, together with how her perspective on translation has developed and deepened thanks to her professional experience. This talk was aimed at current students of translation studies and those who are hoping to work in the translation industry. |  |
19 March 2019 Book Club War and Turpentine by Stefan Hertmans, translated from Dutch by David McKay. Longlisted for the International Man Booker Prize, Stefan Hertmans is an internationally acclaimed Flemish writer. David McKay was awarded the Vondel Translation Prize for this translation. |
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5 March 2019, Graduate Memorial Building The Poetry of Alexander Pushkin To mark the 220th anniversary of the birth of Alexander Pushkin, a poetry evening was held with translator and poet, Julian Henry Lowenfeld. Lowenfeld read Pushkin’s poems in English and Russian and was joined by harpist Arawelle. This event took place at the Graduates’ Memorial Building (GMB) at Trinity College and was organised by the Russian Society and Russian Bridge for the annual Festival of Russian Culture in Dublin. |
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21 February 2019 Literature Ireland welcomed Little Island Books to the Centre for the launch of All Better! - an illustrated collection of rhymes about being under the weather and on the mend for age 4+. Originally written by Latvian poet Inese Zandere, it has been translated and reimagined for the Irish reader by poet Catherine Ann Cullen. For more information about this event, contact info@literatureireland.com |
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19 February 2019: Book Club Among the Lost by Emiliano Monge, translated from the Spanish by Frank Wynne
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18 February 2019 The Trinity Translation PhD: Guide to Getting Started Trinity College Dublin has outstanding resources for PhD candidates in Translation Studies, including expertise in a wide range of languages and cultural contexts, a world-class library, and the Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation with its associated connections and opportunities. Moreover, Trinity is the only university in Ireland that offers practice-based translation PhDs. However, a PhD is unlike any other degree, and applying for one is a more involved process than applying for other category of degree. Many candidates are unsure where to start, and what to expect, both before and during the degree. This session presented the process of applying for a PhD in Translation Studies at Trinity from start to finish, be followed by a Q&A session. |
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12 February 2019 On Georgian Fiction: An Interview with Zurab Karumidze An evening with renowned Georgian novelist and cultural critic Zurab Karumidze, in conversation with founder and director of Dalkey Archive Press, John O’Brien, and co-hosted by the Embassy of Georgia. Karumidze’s novel Dagny, or A Love Feast was written in English with the objective of bringing Georgia and the rest of the world closer. Following the real-life Norwegian poet and dramatist Dagny Juel and her trials as the obsessional subject of historical characters such as Edvard Munch and August Strindberg, the novel tackles subjects as diverse as Shamanic art, Gnosticism, the Bach fugue and modernist aesthetics, muddling historical fact with subversive fiction along the way. |
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7 February 2019 Launch of the Irish translation of Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe We welcomed translator Irene Duffy Lynch to the Centre to discuss her translation of Things Fall Apart into Irish. Irene was joined by Alan Titley, Emeritus Professor of Modern Irish at University College Cork, and H.E. Dr Uzoma E. Emenike, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to Ireland. Since its publication in 1958, Things Fall Apart has sold more than 10 million copies and has been translated into over 50 languages. The Irish translation, Titeann Rudaí as a Chéile has just been published by Coiscéim. This event was kindly sponsored by the Embassy of Nigeria. |
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5 February Translation Student to Translation Professional Isabel Puente Lozano, a recent graduate of our MPhil in Literary Translation, talked about her journey from student life to her current post as vendor manager at STAR Translation Services. This talk was aimed at current students of translation studies who are hoping to work in the translation industry. |
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28 January 2019 Trinity Translation Studies Network: reading group Colleagues in College who have an academic interest in the study of translation were invited to join a new reading group, moderated by our Director, Prof Michael Cronin. The group met fortnightly on Mondays from 17:00-18:30 (during term) to discuss aspects of translation theory. The aim of the network is to provide a supportive environment for colleagues interested in pursuing research topics in translation studies. For more information, please email littrans@tcd.ie |
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15 January 2019 Our first book of the year was Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, by Olga Tokarczuk (Man Booker International Prizewinner). Translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones. |
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18 December 2018 Book Club: The Chilli Bean Paste Clan by Yan Ge, translated from Chinese by Nicky Harman.
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23 November 2018 Mario Praz’s Legacy: On Comparative Literature Today A day long conference to commemorate the cultural legacy of Mario Praz's work in contemporary comparative studies. We were delighted to support this event organised by our colleagues from the Department of Italian. |
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20 November 2018 Book Club: Petite Fleur by Iosi Havilio, translated from Spanish by Lorna Scott Fox
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14 November 2018 Taiwan in Poetry, Poetry in Taiwan The winners of the prestigious 2018 John Dryden Translation Competition, translators Colin Bramwell and Wen-Chi Li gave a talk at the Centre. Li and Bramwell were awarded first prize for their translation of Selections from the Poetry of Yang Mu from Chinese. Their talk, a combination of literary history and poetry reading, aims to introduce Western readers to four Taiwanese poets: Yang Mu, Chen Li, Hsia Yu and Ching Hsiang Hai. |
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12 November 2018 Norwegian writer Edy Poppy was at the Centre to discuss her novel, Anatomy. Monotony. This semi-autobiographical novel is about a young woman from a small Norwegian town, her French husband and their experiment with an open marriage. The book was first published in 2005, and its translation into English by May-Brit Akerholt was published by Dalkey Archive Press. A discussion about this controversial novel and the translations of its covers and titles into other languages. |
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Christopher Kloeble, 17 October 2018
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President Michael D. Higgins, 17 October 2018 Literature Ireland launched the Italian translation of a selection of speeches by Michael D. Higgins, Women and Men of Ireland: Speeches on Revolution (Donne e Uomini d'Irlanda: Discorsi sulla Rivoluzione). We were honoured to welcome the President to the Centre, with his translator, Prof. Enrico Terrinoni, and to hear him speak of the importance of intercultural contact and exchange, and of the crucial role played by literary translators in achieving this. |
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Arturo Fontaine Talavera, 19 October 2018 Arturo Fontaine is a writer and professor of philosophy at the Universidad de Chile. He is also a director of the Museum of Memory and Human Rights, dedicated to the victims of human rights violations committed under the Pinochet dictatorship. We welcomed Arturo for a reading and discussion about his work with Dr Dominic Moran, Christ Church, Oxford, Dr Ciaran Cosgrove, Fellow Emeritus and former Head of Hispanic Studies at Trinity, and Prof. Aileen Douglas, Trinity School of English. |
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Máirtín Ó Direáin, October 2018 Literature Ireland co-hosted a conference with Cló Iar-Chonnacht and Trinity’s Scoil na Gaeilge to commemorate the life and work of poet Máirtín Ó Direáin. Two books were launched: Máirtín Ó Direáin: Rogha Dánta / Selected Poems – translated by Frank Sewell, and Altanna agus Dánta ó Ar Aghaidh. To mark the occasion, Literature Ireland commissioned translations of an Ó Direáin poem into Arabic, Chinese, German, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish, several of which were read aloud during the conference. |
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Culture Night, September 2018 Terry Pratchett at the Unseen University Our year got off to a lively start in September when we took part in Dublin Culture Night. Over the course of the evening, almost 350 people dropped in to help us celebrate Trinity’s special relationship with fantasy author, Terry Pratchett. In a unique inter-faculty collaboration, library cataloguers illustrated the difficulties associated with cataloguing Pratchett’s work; Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation looked how Pratchett’s quirky sense of humour went global; scholars from Children’s Literature delved into Pratchett’s writing for young readers; partners from the Trinity Centre for Digital Humanities showed how the Discworld can be represented using computers; and, recalling Pratchett’s life with Alzheimer’s disease, researchers from Trinity Brain Health and the Alzheimer Society of Ireland myth-busted dementia and explained how “It is possible to live well with dementia and write best-sellers 'like wot I do'." Speakers included Dr Christoph Schmidt-Supprian and John McManus from Trinity Library, Dr Jennifer Edmond of Trinity Centre for Digital Humanities, Dr Sabina Brennan, Dr Máire Brophy, Gary Munnelly and Dr Séamus Lawless from Trinity’s ADAPT Centre, Dr Jane Carroll, Trinity School of English, Helen Rochford-Brennan from the Alzheimer Society of Ireland and Dr James Hadley from the Centre. |
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Michael Marrak, September 2018 German fantasy writer Michael Marrak visited the Centre for a reading from his novella, Die Reise zum Mittelpunkt der Zeit (Journey to the Centre of Time). The work was commissioned by the Goethe-Institut to celebrate its re-opening in Merrion Square after a major refurbishment project. Rachel McNicholl translated the text into English and she gave some excellent examples of the linguistic challenges she faced. |
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September book club The Impostor by Javier Cercas, translated from Spanish by Frank Wynne |
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Translation Studies Network of Ireland, September 2018 We invited colleagues from across the island of Ireland to a meeting to discuss setting up a Translation Studies Network of Ireland (TSNI). The aim of this network is to provide a supportive environment for scholars pursuing research topics in translation studies. Dublin City University, University College Cork, University College Dublin, NUI Galway, Maynooth University, Queen’s University Belfast, Galway-Mayo IT and Trinity were all well represented (see left), along with independent researchers. We are now looking forward to hosting the first annual conference of the Translation Studies Network of Ireland at Trinity on Friday, 18 October 2019, on The Future of Translation in Ireland. |
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The Expedition to the Baobab Tree by Wilma Stockenström, translated from the Afrikaans by J.M. Coetzeepublished by Archipelago Books - Contact: littrans@tcd.ie -
Affections: A Novel by Rodrigo Hasbún , translated by Sophie Hughespublished by Simon & Schuster - Contact: littrans@tcd.ie -
The House with the Stained-Glass Window by Zanna Sloniowska, translated from the Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jonespublished by Hachette UK - Contact: littrans@tcd.ie - 21st November at 18:30pm - Admission free – all are welcome -
Domingo Notaro Poetry LaunchDomingo Notaro Poetry Launch -
Ghachar Ghochar by Vivek Shanbhag, translated from Kannada by Srinath Perurpublished by Faber - Contact: littrans@tcd.ie - 17th October at 18:30pm - Admission free – all are welcome -
A General Theory of Oblivion by Jose Agualusa, translated from the Portuguese by Daniel Hahnpublished by Harvill Secker - Contact: littrans@tcd.ie - 19th September at 18:30pm - Admission free – all are welcome -
Fever Dream by Samantha Schweblin - translated by Megan McDowell20th June at 18:30pm -
(un)performable & (un)translatable ConferenceFriday, 19th May at 12:00pm -
Fish Have No Feet - Book ClubTuesday, 16th May at 18:30pm -
In conversation with Débora Landsberg, Literary Translator in residence (2017)Tuesday, 9th May at 18:30pm
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The Christopher Donovan Translation Prize 2015-2016Clàudia Gispert Codina (MPhil in Literary Translation Prize Awardee) -
Sebastian Truskolaski - Parataxis: Adorno, Hölderlin, KantThursday, 6th April at 1700pm -
Memoirs of a Polar BearTuesday, 18th April at 1830pm -
"Found in Translation" - New Irish and Czech Writing in TranslationThursday, 30th March at 1830pm -
"Untranslatability in Literature and Philosophy, 19-21 March 2017"March 2017 conference -
Book ClubTuesday, 21st March at 1830pm -
Songs in Translation (review)Tuesday, 14th March at 18.00pm
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Translating Dante: The Art of the ImpossibleTuesday, 7th March at 16.00pm -
Anthony OldcornMonday, 13th February at 7.15pm -
Micheál MacLiammóir - poetry in translationThursday, 16th February at 18.30pm -
Book ClubTuesday, 21st February at 18.30pm -
How I Did Not Translate Beckett:Thursday, 9th February at 18.00pm -
Fund raising Event for the Trinity Centre for Literary TranslationFund raising event for the Trinity Centre for Literary Translation -
Dalkey Archive Press receives €60,000 EU GrantDalkey Archive Press -
Book Club TCLTBook Club
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