Between the Couch and Two Cultures

Abstract

Tracing the translation work of the Germanist William Rose (1894–1961) through his literary output and as reflected in his correspondence, lectures and notes. This examination of Rose's archive focuses on his work as a translator of the works of literary exiles and establishes him as one of the key actors in the scholarly rescue of German writers during Second World War. Part of the exiles' cultural capital was embedded in their language skills and the chapter shows how Rose, through his unique ability to synthesize his understanding of German culture, literature, psychoanalysis and psychology into his approach to translation, transformed this cultural capital and reshaped the exiles' understanding of themselves. He is shown to have combined his linguistic abilities and language skills with the language skills of exiles, and with the additions of insights provided through the psychoanalytical exodus, these were “translated” into useful material for the intelligence services' code breaking efforts. His prescient interdisciplinary engagement with German literature and culture shows aspects of German literature as intertwined with history, philosophy, sociology and psychoanalysis as a discipline that uses language as a medium of expression to interpret man's existence and culture.