Critical Translation in World and Comparative Literature

Abstract

Abstract ‘Critical Translation in World and Comparative Literature’ outlines a theory of the ‘world work’ as constituted by the source text and all its translations simultaneously. The world work is brought into being by processes that Reynolds calls ‘prismatic translation’, and sees as arising from the interplay of what he calls ‘translationality’ and ‘Translation Rigidly Conceived’. The mode of existence of the world work poses particular challenges for the practice of world and comparative literary study: Reynolds proposes a theory of ‘critical translation’ to meet these challenges, and exemplifies it from the collaborative Prismatic Jane Eyre project.