35 Variations on a Theme from Translatology

Abstract

35 Variations on a Theme from Translatology Ian Monk (bio) After Georges Perec 00 Source text: To translate is to betray. 01 Alphabetically: AA B EE I L N OO RR SS TTTTT Y 02 Anagram: Bitter? Or ale? Not as tasty. 03 Anagram (other): Treasonably state it: rot! 04 Lipogram in c, d, f, g, h, j, k, m, p, q, u, v, w, x and z: To translate is to betray. 05 Lipogram in a: [End Page 993] To render is to sell out. 06 Lipogram in e: Translation is a back stab. 07 Transposition: To travel is to bewitch. 08 Strict palindrome: “Yar te bots?” i.e. “tal snar tot.” 09 Missing letter: To translate is to be Ray. 10 Two missing letters: To translate is to bray. 11 Added letter: To trans-plate is to be tray. 12 Negation: Not to translate is to betray. 13 Emphasis: To translate, I mean, trying to take something which has been said so memorably well in one language, that it has since become a common or garden phrase, and then try and make another language say exactly the same thing is like, well, to put it mildly, stabbing your best friend in the back some fine day when he was least expecting it. 14 Curtailing: To translate is. [End Page 994] 15 Curtailing (other): To betray? 16 Double curtailing: To is to. 17 Triple contradiction: You’re monolingual? Really? Does that make you honest or something? 18 Another point of view: Snake-tongued, the lot of them! 19 Minimal doggerel: To translate is to decay. To translate is to dismay. To translate is to make hay. 20 Antonymy: To transliterate is to be faithful. 21 Amplification: The act of passing from one idiom to another is equivalent to high treason. 22 Reduction: Not another word! 23 Permutation: To betray is to translate. 24 Crossed interference: To translate or not to be? To be is to betray. [End Page 995] 25 Isomorphisms: Walking implies falling. Eating entails chewing. 26 Synonymous: To put it another way is to do the dirty. 27 Subtle insight: First thought best thought. 28 Another interference: To translate creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time. 29 Homoconsonantism: Utter nasal toast, be true. 30 Homovocalism: On a tale I note a cry. 31 Homophony: Two trans slate Sis Bet Ray. 32 Snowball with clinamen: I Am Now Just Swine Mixing Tongues Messages Allusions Biblically, SaintJerome. [End Page 996] 33 Heterosyntaxism: It seems to me that crossing languages involves crossing the pale. 34 Iambic pentameter: To write it in another tongue’s a crime. 35 Interrogative: So must translation mean betrayal? We leave the reader saddled with this ponderous question. [End Page 997] Ian Monk Ian Monk was born near London, but now lives in Paris, France, where he works as a writer and translator of, among others, Hervé Le Tellier, Georges Perec, Raymond Roussel, and Jacques Roubaud. After contributing to the Oulipo Compendium (Atlas Press), he became a member of the Oulipo in 1998. He has published books in English, such as FamilyArchaeology and Writings for the Oulipo (Make Now), in French (Plouk Town and La Jeunesse de Mek-Ouyes (Cambourakis), and even both: N/S (with Frédéric Forte; Editions de l’Attente). Copyright © 2016 Johns Hopkins University Press