Transcultural counter-memory and translation in contemporary Spanish fiction

Abstract

This chapter examines the intersection between memory and translation by focusing on contemporary Spanish fiction and its English translations. First, it explains how literature served to propagate the official narrative established by the Franco regime after the Spanish Civil War and during the subsequent dictatorship. Dissident voices of authors in exile and international writers who had experienced the war then created a counter-memory of the conflict in its immediate aftermath. After the transition to democracy, contemporary Spanish fiction has added to this counter-memory and suggested new ways of memorializing the traumatic past. In an effort to encourage a dialogue between translation studies and memory studies, the chapter underscores the role of translation in the transcultural circulation of this counter-memory. Drawing on Erll’s work, it proposes an analysis of two novels, La voz dormida (2002) and Los girasoles ciegos (2004), and their respective English translations. The focus lies on two specific strategies used by the authors to convey counter-memory: intertextual references that highlight multidirectional connections between the Holocaust and the Spanish Civil War, and tonality to mock the figure of Franco. A translation that is attentive to these textual and stylistic aspects, however challenging, seems crucial to the transcultural circulation of the Spanish counter-memory.