Translators in Kensington Gardens: Polish Translations of J. M. Barrie’s First Peter Pan Novel

Abstract

J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens combines almost all translation problems that can be found in children’s classics. These include, first of all, the method of building the textual world, immersed in the realities of space and time, the double address of the text, whose designed recipient is suspended—much like Peter Pan himself—between childhood and adulthood. Secondly, the complexity of the narrative, based on the interweaving of voices, as well as the multiplicity of stylisations, humour, lyricism combined with nostalgia and the fairy-tale quality. Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens was translated into Polish only twice—by Zofia Rogoszowna in 1913 and by Maciej Slomczynski in 1991. These two translations, telling the Peter’s story in two different and somehow antithetical voices, can be analysed not only in terms of narrative and linguistic issues but also in terms of literary conventions influencing the translation, censorship by the translator, and the ways translators understand their role towards the texts and their audiences (translator-moralist versus impartial objectivist). The main aim of the chapter is to discuss translation challenges in Barrie’s novel and analyse different strategies followed in the translation process. This critical perspective is complemented with a practical attitude developed while working on a new Polish translation of Peter Pan in Kensinton Gardens, created with the willingness to restore and refresh this slightly forgotten masterpiece for the Polish reader.