Rhizomatic Translation and the Censor State: Publishing Aimé Césaire in Estado Novo Portugual

Abstract

Poet, theorist and politician, Aimé Césaire produced, over the course of his literary and political career, a singular body of work equally noteworthy for its analysis of colonialism as for his poetic innovation. Publishing his texts in Portuguese under the censorship regime of the Estado Novo required therefore a series of delicate decisions on the part of editors in order to avoid official prohibition. This article examines in particular the only Portuguese publication to make it to press during this period, an anthology of poems published by Snu Abecassis in 1970, and the relationship of this anthology to the broader Césairean paratext, arguing for a “rhizomatic” understanding of the publication and translation, necessitated by the political context.