Call for Abstracts:
Literary Translation of Greek and Latin (Since 1869)
Translation Panel, 150th annual SCS Meeting in San Diego, 2019
Organizers: SCS Committee on Translations of Classical Authors
From Livius Andronicus to the multifarious translation landscape of the twenty-first century, the re-creation of classic works in new languages has brought ancient literature to new audiences and new cultural contexts.
This panel seeks papers that focus on the art of literary translation. For our society’s sesquicentennial, we especially welcome papers that address translation into English since 1869.
All translation is interpretation: Textual decisions drive interpretations, yet interpretive stances also drive textual decisions. Translation is an especially intimate and visible active reading in which the reader of the source language work becomes the writer of the English work.
Possible areas of focus include, but are not limited to:
- How literary translations of single authors have changed over time.
- Trends in literary translation
- Translation in times of crisis
- The status of translation in classics
- How translation engages with scholarship
- The responsibilities of the translator
- Theories of and approaches to translation
- Political or cultural use of translation
The Committee on Translations of Classical Authors is in the process of producing a searchable database bibliography of all translations of Greek and Latin authors translated from 1869 (and ongoing) initially in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. Grand Valley State University developed the Tiresias database, before transferring it to UC-Irvine, who has agreed to host the project at the International Center for Writing and Translation.
Abstracts for papers should be submitted electronically as Word documents by January 31, 2018 to Donald Mastronarde (djmastronarde@berkeley.edu), preferably with the subject heading “abstract_translation_SCS2019”. All abstracts will be judged anonymously and so should not reveal the author’s name, but the email should provide name, abstract title, and affiliation. Abstracts should be 650 words or fewer and should follow the guidelines for individual abstracts (https://classicalstudies.org/annual-meeting/guidelines-authors-abstracts), except that works cited should be put at the end of the document, not in a separate text box.