Riggs and Terry - Lane

 The analogy of translation as a contributor to (or the entire process of) life and death is particularly striking in both of these pieces. It seems inherent to the process of translation to injure (and even kill) the text to facilitate its reincarnation into another language, or to reincarnate it by transmutation to avoid killing the text (see the "live dog" analogy). This analogy is of course, not unique to this text; translation is often seen as a form of violence or violation against the text and it is the translator's duty to ensure that the text they've metaphorically set on fire rises from the ashes like a phoenix. But a phoenix cannot be a 鳳凰, of course.

Which brings me to another point--these two meditations on J->E translation seem to touch on the fact that it's essential to kill (or knock unconscious) the part of the brain that thinks in Japanese when translating into English, and vice versa. When an English speaker thinks of a phoenix, they have a specific image in their mind, one taken from Greek mythology and the Western world, while a 鳳凰 calls to mind a Chinese mythological bird that is further detached from that image of reincarnation. Translating "phoenix" to 「火の鳥」is also problematic in that it calls to mind the Tezuka Osamu manga for many Japanese speakers. Only by setting the part of the brain that thinks of the English word "phoenix" on fire can a translator see the word rise from the ashes in Japanese; 不死鳥 carries the same image of resurrection that the other two options lack.

I also often worry about the depiction of translation as violence if the text and its translation are depicted as women--I wonder if there are any feminist translators who have different metaphors and approaches to translation. (Personally, I like to think of it as a kind of eating, though this can't be entirely detached from the violence of hunting and consuming. Is violence necessary for these analogies? Is there a non-violent act of translation?)