Poetry Translating as Expert Action Processes, priorities and networks

Chapter 5. Five translators translate 

TU277 strovuur ons aanstak. Strovuur [SEARCHES

DUTCH → ENGLISH

DICTIONARY]

TU278 sudden fire, straw fire, spontaneous combustion,

TU279 [Kouwenaar] also suggested, as I recall, that

he was just talking about the fire in the fireplace.

TU280 Okay,

TU281 I’m looking at the [on-screen] thesaurus for fire.

TU282 Fire- look up- put

TU283 blaze [in the search box] as well, make it a bit

easier to find –

TU284 Fire: bonfire,

TU285 ??^19 fire, watch fire, coal fire. Blaze; fireball, forest fire.

TU286 #

TU287 catch fire, draw fire.

TU288 light blaze, blaze of light,

TU289 fire?? – maybe I should just use fire,

TU290 and forget about the stro.

TU291 [...] strovuur/kindling, fire

TU292 # ignited us.

5.3.5.3 Image, re-imaging and source-poet intent

Image was the second most time-consuming micro-sequence overall (23.7% of

tape-units: Figure 39). Image micro-sequences explore text-world meaning. When

applied to the source poem, they analyse semantic units bigger than words or fixed

expressions, and establish or interpret poetic intent – as during Irene’s Draft 1:

TU53 [...] And then [Kouwenaar] talks about

TU54 liggend in wat wij bezaten – literally lying down

TU55 in what we possessed. And a sort of

TU56 feeling of being self-satisfied, being

TU57 content. This is what I get from that line.

When applied to the emerging target version, they assess potential solutions for

their fit with source-text world and tone, as during Irene’s Draft 2:

TU447 And so we get joy lingered around us like smoke

[...]

TU451 What about enveloped, because that’s smoke we’re

talking about here, isn’t it?

[...]

TU453 Yes, sort of blanket of- that would be good.

TU454 And [...] if the place has been cold and damp,

TU455 and they suddenly put a huge fire in, there

TU456 would be a lot of smoke, so envelop would be

a suitable word.

19. ?? denotes untranscribable word(s).

Lexis Dr2/#11

Lexis Dr2/#11

Image

Dr2/#10

Text-

helper

Image Dr1/#6

Image Dr2/#19