Supply-driven Translation: Compensating for Lack of Demand

Abstract

This chapter challenges the dominant notion in descriptive translation studies that literary translation is effectively driven by demand from the target culture. Gideon Toury argues that a target culture translates to fill gaps exposed by a source culture which the target culture views as prestigious. While this notion may work historically for the purposes of comparative literature, literary historians and translation theory, and in the context of high-brow literature, this chapter considers it unsuited to other genres, less widely translated literatures or the contemporary book industry. Using mainly Scandinavian and Czech examples, and others found in this volume, the chapter elucidates the notion of supply-driven translation from smaller European literatures, aimed at fighting the norm of non-translation. The chapter concludes by providing a typology of supply-driven interventions, with some commentary on their apparent advantages and drawbacks that sheds light on the roles, motivations and contributions of different intermediaries in the translation process.