The Linguist

@Linguist_CIOL JUNE/JULY The Linguist 9 lurking just outside (with its different yet similar 'd' sounds). I took liberties with the translation of the verb камлає (kamlaie; which can be roughly translated as performing a magical, almost shamanic ritual) and the sinister feeling the line evokes, by introducing the verb 'drums'. This verb helps tie together the draining heart, the implied threat of explosions, and the sinister feel of the magic which comes from the other side. THE PITFALLS OF 'ACCURACY' Discussions in the literature helped me to adopt a flexible approach. Philip Lewis writes that the traditional expectation of accuracy "puts the translator under pressure not simply to produce a version of the original that reads well or sounds right in the target language but also to understand and interpret the original masterfully so as to reproduce its messages faithfully." 4 Postcolonial and feminist theorists, such as Gayatri Spivak and Luise von Flotow, move away from the idea of faithful accuracy to emphasise the transformative and collaborative nature of the translation process, in which the translator's own personhood and positionality in relation to the source text become an important feature of the work. For myself, engaging with postcolonial and feminist translation theorists for my academic research on gender and translation has not so much swayed me from the path of faithfulness as freed me – internally – to embrace my own personhood as a linguist who is also a poet. While the linguist in me strives for accuracy, it is in my capacity as a poet and poetry editor that I am most in tune with the poet's intent to evoke feeling – the feeling of loss, of trauma, of solidarity – as I strive to embody not just the original words but the feelings they evoke. Spivak touches on this when she writes: "The task of the translator is to facilitate this love between the original and its shadow, a love that permits fraying… First, then, the translator must surrender to the text. She must solicit the text to show the limits of its language… translation is the most intimate act of reading." 5 My scholarly translations allowed me to be moved by the source text in languages that were relatively new to me, but in literary translation it is the translated text which needs to move the reader who does not have any other way to access the original. In a short time, I came to trust myself to be moved by Ukrainian war poetry and to strive to (re)create its emotional impact in my English translation. The anxiety, bombardment and sleeplessness, the relentless and heart-rending sensory impact of war, are as important to convey as are the literal meanings of the words. Wartime translation serves people whose voices are most urgent now, helping them to find new worldwide audiences that may be empowered to support the fight for liberty and democracy against atrocities. It is not about me, yet as an American poet and linguist born in Ukraine, I have discovered something for myself too: to do a literary translation is to open up to an organic and flawed process of textual collaboration which goes beyond the search for accuracy and into the domain of deep feeling. As translators of wartime poetry, we should not shy away from our own emotional work, from our own visceral, human responses to the original. I believe that leaning into that feeling is aligned with feminist and postcolonial translation theory. Notes 1 I remain eternally grateful to Vitaly for his support and encouragement, and for kindly discussing these translations with me. 2 Yulia Maksymenko's translation published in Chytomo; and a translation by Amelia Glaser and Yuliya Ilchuk published in Lithub 3 Transliteration in accordance with the BGN/PCGN 2019 Agreement for Romanization of Ukrainian 4 Lewis, P E (1985) 'The Measure of Translation Effects.' In Difference in Translation, 31-62 5 Spivak, G C (2012) 'The Politics of Translation.' In Venuti, L (ed) The Translation Studies Reader, 312-329 FEATURES A VISCERAL JOURNEY (L-r) Halyna Kruk's 'You Stand with Your Little "No War" Sign' has been shared widely in Ukrainian and English; translating in wartime involves responding to violence in real-time; Halyna Kruk; and a strong folkloric tradition is evident in the poetry of the country's foremost writers, including Lesya Ukrainka (1871-1913) HALYNA KRUK CC BY-SA 4.0

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