Identidades traduzidas: abordagens éticas na tradução de El Emante Bilingüe

Abstract

The present article points out some ethical questions found in the translation of Juan Marsé’s novel El amante bilíngüe (1990). Understood from the perspective of a migrant narrative (CORNEJO-POLAR, 1996), plurilingual and polyphonic, the book recreates, in the plot plane, the identity dissolution process of the character – in which historical, cultural and linguistic relations between Spain and Catalonia issues are mirrored in a caricatural way. Interwoven with the plot, the plane of language is woven like a network of reverberations, with the presence of two languages and a literary dialect. In dealing with this complex literary artifact based on linguistic plurality, new problems are posed to the translator: the aspects related to contact and mediation between cultures are evidently intertwined with the literary re-creation that occurs in the crossing between languages. Defining a translation strategy that contemplates the literary resources employed by the author thus implies reflection on the ethical choices involved in the translation act.