“Speaking with the Elgin marbles in his mouth?”: Modernism and translation in Welsh writing in English

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article claims that one of the most salient aspects of Welsh anglophone modernism – that which makes it distinctive, and distinctively modernist – is that it emerges from the uneasy relationship between languages; it is a literature in translation. The article proceeds to explore the role of translation from Welsh into English in the anglophone modernism of Wales by discussing Caradoc Evans’ alleged exposure of the warped working of the Welsh mind, David Jones’ revisionist history of Britain and Margiad Evans’ sympathetic depiction of Welsh-speaking communities. While the process of translation from Welsh makes anglophone Welsh modernism distinctive, the depiction of Welsh-language communities in English-language texts – whether prejudicial or sympathetic – is always problematic. The article ends by arguing against the tendency, manifest in Welsh anglophone modernism, as in contemporary literary criticism, to equate language difference with racial difference.