Abstract
How is poetry translation essentially different from poetry writing? Poetry writing pertains primarily to the acquisition of a main skills set, for instance the mastery of poetic forms and of literary devices. At the writing level, how does translation correlate with poetry writing? On the one hand, poetry translation predominantly grapples with losses and gains due to incongruities and constraints rooted in poetic forms. Either choosing to comply with or digressing from a certain poetic form remains a constant issue that poetry translation incontrovertibly addresses; the outcome of such often involving rewriting. On the other hand, the practice of poetry translation as a linguistic activity becomes infused into even smaller details of poetry, thus making itself an imitable, yet creative act. In this essay, I want to pursue the following lesser-explored questions: What is the delineation between translation and creative works? How and when does a translator-writer deviate from the original text and assert a certain degree of expressiveness? Along the same line, how does deviation from translation facilitate the translator-writer’s growth in creative writing? To answer these questions, I intend to firstly review the concept of poetry translation as a form of creative writing. This scrutiny then draws some insights from empirical evidence observed from ‘Trans-creative writing’. It is hoped that this experimental method can provide more solid evidence for translation as a creative writing pedagogy.
Recommended Citation
Fang, Xia
(2023)
"Crossing the Boundaries: Integrating Poetry Writing with Translation Practice,"
Journal of Creative Writing Studies: Vol. 8:
Iss.
1, Article 7.
Available at:
https://repository.rit.edu/jcws/vol8/iss1/7