Slovenska Literatura (Nov 2019)
Interliterariness and the History of Literary Translation in Rudo Brtáň´s Monograph on Bohuslav Tablic
Abstract
The paper reflects on the history of literary translation and the interliterary relations presented in the monograph by Rudo Brtáň titled Bohuslav Tablic (1769 – 1832). Život a dielo (1974)/ Bohuslav Tablic (1769 – 1832). Life and Work (1974). This is the first complex monograph written on B. Tablic in the historiography of Slovak literary history and it is closely related to R. Brtáň´s systematic interest in the history of Slovak literature of the national revival period. B. Tablic is reflected on as a pioneer of literary translation in Slovakia and his translations as well as his own literary production are placed in a wider interliterary context. The paper analyzes and assesses Brtáň´s approach to the issues of literary historical and translatological reflection of Tablic´s translations from German, English and French, it sees his translations and his own production in the Czecho-Slovak context, it maps the range of the authors translated and their links to the literary aesthetical preferences of that time. Brtáň´s monograph is seen critically here, especially in contrast with newer literary historical findings and research into the history of literary translation. The paper points out to several historically constrained assessments of Tablic´s translations (translations of the works by J. A. Hermes a J. J. Spalding), verifies Brtáň´s inaccuracies when identifying the original texts of individual translations and translation adaptations (interconnections between ballads by G. A. Bürger and Tablic´s production, the issue of Tablic´s mistake about the authorship of the ballad by T. Percy The Hermit of Warkworth), in addition, Brtáň´s analyses of his book translations (Anglické múzy v česko-slovenském oděvu/English Muses in Czecho-Slovak Clothing) and the translation of Nicolas Boileau´s Umění básnířské /The Art of Poetry are reflected on against a background of recent research into this subject.
