Marmontel traducteur, ou les ruses de la réécriture

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to submit the translations produced by Marmontel (1723-1799) of La Boucle de cheveux enlevée (1746) and La Pharsale (1766) to a close examination in order to see how the textual devices used by the philosophe reveal his own voice. The article seeks therefore to study the markers of his subjectivity (comments, deviations from the text, rewritings, additions) which are detectable in these two productions, in order to see how the intentions that underlie them find echoes in Marmontel’s life, work and thought. It is on the basis of the authorial intrusions that abound in these translations that we will finally be able to grasp how the pen of this native of Limousin betrays the issues at stake in what really is a poetics of ruse.

Keywords

• Marmontel (Jean-François)
• Pope (Alexander)
• Lucan
• translation
• rewriting
• truth