4 Derrida and Translation

Foran, Lisa

doi:10.1057/978-1-137-57758-0_5

Lisa Foran²

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Abstract

In this chapter I do three things. First of all, I explore Derrida’s translation of a particular word and in so doing I reveal the (im)possible position of the translator. This (im)possibility is key to my claim that subject/other relation is best understood as surviving translating, a claim I will return to in the next chapter. Second, I go on to examine the relationship between translation, political power, and the construction of identity. As I demonstrate, power is deployed through language and translation, a situation particularly evident in post-colonial states. Furthermore, the question of the ‘law of translation’ or the ‘debt of translation’ is a constant concern for Derrida; a law that is intimately linked with the relation between the subject and the other. Finally, I show how the subject/other relation is complicated by Derrida through the impossibility of an absolute border. I do this through an examination of the origins of translation in the figure of the Babel narrative. Under the rubric of this myth, I explore Derrida’s interrogation of the proper name and multilingualism. In both cases I show the inherently divided nature of both names and languages and the manner in which their ‘identity’ emerges only through differentiation with multiple others.

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Notes

1.
1. This was originally a conference presentation at the Quinzièmes Assises de la Traduction Littéraire à Arles (ATLAS) in 1998. The translator of this article into English, Lawrence Venuti, also published an article on his experience of translating Derrida and institutional resistance to Translation Studies in general titled ‘Translating Derrida on Translation: Relevance and Disciplinary Resistance’ (Yale Journal of Criticism, 2003 Vol. 16 No.2 pp. 237–262). For Venuti’s strategy of how to translate Derrida, see in particular pp. 252–7 of this article.
2.
2. Relevant n. p. 44 /trans. p. 196 n.8.
3.
3. In Le pas au-delà (1973) Blanchot introduces the neologism of an arrête which combines both the verb arrêter and the noun arête meaning ‘ridge’, ‘cutting edge’ or ‘backbone’. This edge or sharp dividing line introduces an instability to arrêter making it perform in an undecidable way as something like ‘death ridge’ or ‘suspension edge’.
4.
4. DTB pp. 209–216 /trans. pp. 165–172.
5.
5. OA p. 160 /trans. p. 120 [my italics].
6.
6. Venuti, article cited, p. 255 Venuti here notes that he maintains the various spellings in his own English version of the text, as well as the numerous words in German in order to foreground the issue of translation and to turn the reader into a translator.
7.
7. Relevant, pp. 22–3 /trans. p. 176 Baugh & Cable (op. cit. pp. 163–181) list the noun of this adjective, ‘relieve’, as coming to English through the Norman invasion and hence a contribution from French. The Oxford English Dictionary also cites it as arriving from Latin through the French relever an early meaning of which was to ‘rise from the dead’. However, while one can find numerous definitions of relever in French dictionaries the adjective relevante is conspicuously absent.
8.
8. See DG, p. 231 /trans. p. 162.
9.
9. Relevant p. 25 /trans. p. 178 [italics in original].
10.
10. Relevant pp. 25–6 /trans. pp. 178–9.
11.
11. Relevant p. 27 /trans. p. 180 The ‘word’ here of course, carries multiple meanings. ‘In the beginning was the Word [λόγος], and the Word was with God [Θεόν], and the Word was God’ (John 1:1, New International Version [NIV]). On the one hand, in the context it is strictly speaking a calculable measurement. On the other hand, ‘word’ also means promise, honour, oath as in ‘I give you my word’—‘I make a promise to you’. And from this in French parole we derive the English word ‘parole’; a prisoner gives his ‘word’ to abide by the law or to return to prison at a given time.
12.
12. Relevant p. 28 /trans. p. 181 The question of translation as a ruin ties with the notion of a sur-vival; a translation makes present a trace of the original not as fully present but as a memory of what was once the ‘original’. This would also be the case of all texts as translations of other texts and as containing within them their own future translations. The architectural motif should also not be passed over. As Derrida notes in a commentary on Descartes’ use of the word roman and the dream of a universal language which would be like a completed tower of Babel; architecture and linguistics cannot be separated—see Transfert pp. 327–8 /trans. p. 32.
13.
13. Relevant pp. 30–1 /trans. p. 183.
14.
14. Picking up on this idea of economy in the play Simon Critchley and Tom McCarthy in their own reading argue that the play illustrates the Aristotelian distinction between two types of economy. On the one hand a ‘proper’ economy of the household or oikos which would be understood as a good, that is to say, finite or limited economy which seeks only what is necessary for the household to live well—the oikonomia of Antonio. And on the other hand, an illusory or indefinite economy based on the infinite exchangeability of goods through the introduction of money (to chrema)—the techne chrematisike of Shylock. (Critchley & McCarthy ‘Universal Shylockery: Money and Morality in The Merchant of Venice’, Diacritics vol.34, no.1, 2004 pp. 3–17) See in particular p. 7 and pp. 13–14.
15.
15. Relevant p. 31 /trans. p. 184.
16.
16. Relevant p. 33 /trans. p. 185.
17.
17. Relevant p. 34 /trans. p. 186.
18.
18. Relevant p. 40 /trans. p. 192.
19.
19. Critchley & McCarthy, op.cit. p. 13.
20.
20. Relevant p. 35 /trans. p. 188.
21.
21. Shakespeare (Merchant of Venice [MV] 4.1.180–3) cited in Derrida, Relevant p. 39 /trans. p. 191.
22.
22. Relevant p. 39 /trans. pp. 191–2.
23.
23. Shakespeare (MV 4.1.184–93) cited in Derrida; Relevant pp. 39–40 /trans. p. 192.
24.
24. Relevant p. 40 /trans. p. 193.
25.
25. Relevant n. p. 40 /trans. n.5 p. 193.
26.
26. Davis, op.cit., p.50.
27.
27. Relevant p. 42 /trans. p. 194 See also ‘Theology of Translation’ in Transfert pp. 371–394 /trans. pp. 64–80.
28.
28. Relevant pp. 42–3 /trans. p. 195.
29.
29. Relevant p. 43 /trans. p. 196.
30.
30. In a lecture delivered in 1968 and subsequently published in 1972: ‘Le puits et la pyramide: Introduction à la sémiologie de Hegel’ (‘The Pit and the Pyramid: Introduction to Hegel’s Semiology’).Published in M pp. 79–127 /trans. pp. 69–108 On the use of this translation, see also ‘Les fins de l’homme’ (‘The Ends of Man’) (in M pp. 129–164 /trans. pp. 109–136), in particular pp. 139–142 /trans. pp. 117–119.
31.
31. Relevant pp. 43–4 /trans. p. 196 See also OA pp. 171–2 /trans. pp. 129–30.
32.
32. ‘De l’économie restreinte à l’économie générale: Un hegelianisme sans réserve’ (‘From Restricted to General Economy: A Hegelianism without Reserve’) in ED pp. 369–407 /trans. pp. 327–350.
33.
33. VP p. 115 /trans. p. 103 This of course does not mean that we know nothing but that ‘we are beyond absolute knowledge.’ What Derrida seeks to undermine with the idea of ‘an unheard-of question’ is the history of philosophy as ‘an absolute will-to-hear-oneself-speak’ that would in some way come before or as foundational to representation. The question of hearing (ouïr) and the ear (oreille) remained a concern for Derrida in many ways, see for example L’oreille de l’autre (The Ear of the Other—OA) or ‘L’oreille de Heidegger Philopolémologie (Geschlecht IV)’ [in Politique de l’amitié (Paris: Editions Galilée, 1994) pp. 341–419. Trans. by John P. Leavey Jr. ‘Heidegger’s Ear: Philopolemology (Geschlecht IV)’ in John Sallis (ed.) Reading Heidegger: Commemorations (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1993) pp. 163–218]. In this latter work part of Derrida’s reading of Heidegger is to interrogate how one can hear what Heidegger describes as the ‘unheard’ essence.
34.
34. M trans. p. 43 n.15.
35.
35. Relevant p. 46 /trans. p. 198.
36.
36. Relevant pp. 44–5 /trans. p. 197.
37.
37. Benjamin, p. 62 /trans. p. 75.
38.
38. Relevant p. 45 /trans. p. 197.
39.
39. Relevant p. 46 /trans. p. 198.
40.
40. Relevant p. 46 /trans. p. 199.
41.
41. Relevant pp. 46–7 /trans. p. 199.
42.
42. Davis notes that the ‘certain concept’ of translation that Derrida refers to—an unproblematic transfer of meaning ‘without any essential harm being done’—is indeed that which has dominated translation theory at least since the Middle Ages (see Davis p. 18).
43.
43. Transfert pp. 283–342 /trans. pp. 1–42.
44.
44. Transfert p. 289 /trans. p. 5.
45.
45. Transfert p. 290 /trans. p. 6 ‘du droit à la philosophie’ could also be translated as: ‘for the right to philosophy’; Derrida is playing here with what becomes the principle focus of this essay, namely that in order to plead for one’s right (to philosophy or for one’s rights in general) one must speak the language of the law.
46.
46. Transfert p. 297 /trans. p. 11.
47.
47. Transfert p. 299 /trans. p. 12.
48.
48. Transfert p. 299 /trans. p. 12.
49.
49. Transfert pp. 300–301 /trans. pp. 12–13.
50.
50. Transfert p. 301 /trans. p. 13.
51.
51. Declan Kiberd Inventing Ireland: The Literature of the Modern Nation (London: Random House, 1995) p. 624.
52.
52. Seamus Deane was a founding member of the Field Day Project; a literary project that produced a number of plays (including Brian Friel’s Translations), poems, pamphlets and recordings and in short sought to establish a cultural space within which the dual nature of Irish identity could be mutually explored and in particular translated. See Aidan O’Malley Field Day and the Translation of Irish Identities: Performing Contradictions (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), see in particular ‘In Other Words: Locating a Touring Theatre Company’ pp. 1–24.
53.
53. See Declan Kiberd, op.cit. In particular: ‘Writing Ireland Reading England’ pp. 268–285 and ‘Translating Tradition’ pp. 624–638 For a detailed account of the ‘translational-transnational’ history of the Irish language and the history of translation in the establishment of ‘Irish’ identity see for example Michael Cronin Translating Ireland: Translation, Languages, Culture (Cork: Cork University Press, 1995). There is not the space here to discuss the issue of post-colonialism and translation; an area of prolific scholarship over the last thirty years.
54.
54. Transfert pp. 321–2 /trans. p. 28.
55.
55. Transfert p. 317 /trans. p. 24.
56.
56. Transfert p. 295 /trans. p. 9 Derrida cites the letter of Henri II to Guy de Bruès in 1556.
57.
57. Transfert p. 320 /trans. p. 7.
58.
58. Transfert pp. 314–316 /trans. pp. 22–4.
59.
59. Descartes Discourse on Method cited in Derrida, Transfert pp. 283–4 /trans. p. 1 and passim.
60.
60. Cited by Derrida Transfert p. 308 /trans. p. 19.
61.
61. Transfert p. 314 /trans. p. 22.
62.
62. Survivre pp. 140–1 /trans. pp. 76–7.
63.
63. Survivre p. 161 /trans. p. 95.
64.
64. DTB p. 239 /trans. p. 196.
65.
65. DTB p p. 239–243 /trans. pp. 196–200.
66.
66. Kimberley Brown ‘In Borges Shadow’ Janus Head 8 (1), 2005 pp. 349–351 However, this seems to be only di Giovanni’s version of events. Lawrence Venuti claims the relationship was ended by Borges himself as a result of de Giovanni’s excessively free translations that Borges felt significantly distorted his work—see Lawrence Venuti The Scandals of Translation: Towards an Ethics of Difference (London & New York: Routledge, 1998) pp. 4–5.
67.
67. Henri Desbois, Le droit d’auteur en France (Paris: Dalloz, 1978) p. 41 cited in Derrida DTB p. 243 /trans. p. 199.
68.
68. DTB p. 242 /trans. p. 199 For more on the strange situation of the translator who ‘both is and is not an author’ in terms of copyright law, see for example Lawrence Venuti The Translator’s Invisibility: A History of Translation (London & New York: Routledge, 1995) pp. 6–12.
69.
69. Maurice Blanchot La part du feu (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 1949) p. 173 /trans. by Charlotte Mandell The Work of Fire (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995) p. 176.
70.
70. Survivre p. 192 /trans. p. 121.
71.
71. Survivre p. 191 /trans. p. 120.
72.
72. Survivre p. 192 /trans. p. 121.
73.
73. Relevant p. 26 /trans. p. 179.
74.
74. Blanchot, cited in Derrida, Survivre p. 195 /trans. p. 123.
75.
75. Survivre p. 196 /trans. p. 124.
76.
76. Survivre p. 196 /trans. p. 124.
77.
77. Survivre p. 197 /trans. p. 125.
78.
78. Survivre pp. 197–8 /trans. pp. 125–6.
79.
79. Originally presented in a different and shorter form at a bilingual conference in 1992 Louisiana State University, entitled Echoes from Elsewhere/Renvois d’ailleurs.
80.
80. Mono. p. 15 /trans. p. 2 and passim.
81.
81. Mono. p. 13 /trans. p. 1.
82.
82. Mono. p. 24 /trans. p. 9.
83.
83. Mono. p. 67 /trans. p. 38.
84.
84. Mono. p. 68 /trans. p. 38.
85.
85. Mono. p. 67 /trans. p. 38.
86.
86. Mono. p. 68 /trans. p. 38.
87.
87. Mono. pp. 29–51 /trans. pp. 12–27 Derrida also discusses the Franco-Algerian situation in De l’hospitalité: Anne Dufourmantelle invite Jacques Derrida à repondre (Paris: Clamann-Lévy, 1997) Trans. by Rachel Bowlby Of Hospitality Anne Dufourmantelle Invites Jacques Derrida to Respond (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000) pp. 125–133 /trans. pp. 141–147.
88.
88. Mono. p. 35 /trans. p. 16.
89.
89. Mono. p. 32 /trans. p. 14.
90.
90. Mono. pp. 87–8 /trans. p. 52: ‘They [Franco-Maghrebian Jews] could not identify themselves in the terms of models, norms, or values whose development was to them alien because French, metropolitan, Christian, and Catholic. In the milieu where I lived, we used to say “the Catholics”; we called all the non-Jewish French people “Catholics,” even if they were sometimes Protestants, or perhaps even Orthodox: “Catholic” meant anyone who was neither a Jew, a Berber, nor an Arab. At that time, these young indigenous Jews could easily identify neither with the “Catholics,” the Arabs, nor the Berbers, whose language they did not generally speak in that generation’.
91.
91. Mono. p. 42 /trans. p. 21.
92.
92. Mono. p. 69 /trans. p. 39.
93.
93. Mono. p. 117 /trans. p. 61.
94.
94. Mono. p. 118 /trans. p. 61 See also, Kiberd, op.cit. in particular ‘Return to the Source?’ pp. 133–36.
95.
95. Mono. p. 123 /trans. p. 65.
96.
96. Mono. p. 126 /trans. p. 67.
97.
97. Mono. p. 127 /trans. p. 68.
98.
98. Mono. p. 128 /trans. p. 68 See also pp. 109–111 /trans. pp. 90–1 where Derrida discusses Levinas’s own relation with the French language as a ‘host’ language though never a maternal language.
99.
99. Mono. p. 128 /trans. p. 68.
100.
100. Mono. p. 134 /trans. p. 72.
101.
101. DG p. 329 /trans. p. 231 Although Derrida is here referring to Rousseau’s essay ‘On the Origin of Languages’ and not to a myth, it nonetheless reflects many of the mythic motifs.
102.
102. Deborah Levine Gera Ancient Greek Ideas on Speech, Language and Civilisation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003) pp. 117–118.
103.
103. Diss. pp. 69–198 /trans. pp. 69–186
104.
104. Diss. pp. 95–107 /trans. pp. 89–97.
105.
105. Diss. p. 105–6 /trans. pp. 96–7.
106.
106. Diss. pp. 105–6 /trans. pp. 96–7.
107.
107. Genesis 11:1–9 (New International Version [NIV]).
108.
108. Elad Lapidot ‘What is the Reason for Translating Philosophy? I Undoing Babel’ in Lisa Foran (Ed.) Translation and Philosophy (Oxford: PeterLang, 2012) pp. 89–105 [Hereafter Lapidot] p. 89.
109.
109. DTB p. 209 /trans. p. 165.
110.
110. DTB p. 209 /trans. p. 165.
111.
111. DTB pp. 228–9 /trans. p. 185.
112.
112. Davis, op.cit. p. 10.
113.
113. DG p. 159 /trans. p. 109.
114.
114. ibid.
115.
115. DG pp. 163–4 /trans. p. 111.
116.
116. DTB p. 210 /trans. p. 166.
117.
117. From which it might at first seem that the measure of translatability would be equal to the measure by which a word belongs to a language. Paradoxically, however, we will discover further on in this chapter that the more a word or phrase belongs to just one language, the less translatable it becomes. That is to say, the more a word/phrase is particular to one language—the less open it is to the other—the less translatable it becomes. And, as we saw in the last chapter, a text if totally untranslatable in fact disappears entirely. So that it is only by belonging and not belonging to a language at the same time that a word/phrase/text can manage to sur-vive.
118.
118. DTB p. 216 /trans. p. 172.
119.
119. DTB p. 210 /trans. p. 166 (Derrida cites Voltaire’s Dictionnaire philosophique)
120.
120. DTB p. 210 /trans. p. 166.
121.
121. OA pp. 135–6 /trans. p. 101.
122.
122. OA p. 135 /trans. p. 100.
123.
123. DTB p. 211 /trans. p. 167.
124.
124. Transfert pp. 293–4 /trans. p. 8 ‘The imposition of a State language implies an obvious purpose of conquest and administrative domination of the territory, exactly like the opening of a road [...] But there is a still more urgent necessity for us, right here: that by which the aforementioned figure of the path to be cleared imposes itself, in a way, from within, in order to tell the progress of a language.’
125.
125. Transfert p. 291 /trans. p. 6.
126.
126. Transfert pp. 283–309 /trans. pp. 1–19.
127.
127. DTB p. 218 /trans. p. 174.
128.
128. OA p. 135 /trans. p. 101.
129.
129. Genesis 11:8–9 translated from the French translation by Chouraqui, cited by Derrida DTB p. 214 /trans. p. 170. This ‘over which he proclaims his name’ is significantly different in other translations of the text. In English language versions of the text such as the NIV we read: ‘That is why it was called Babel—because there the L ord confused the language of the whole world’ and in the King James Version (KJV): ‘Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the L ord did there confound the language of all the earth.’ Similar formulations are found in both the French Louis Segond translation: ‘C’est pourquoi on l’appela du nom de Babel, car c’est là que l’Éternel confondit le langage de toute la terre’ [That is why it was called by the name of Babel, since it was there that the Eternal confused the language of all the earth]; and in the standard Reina Valera Spanish translation: ‘Por esto fué llamado el nombre de ella Babel, porque allí confudió Jehová el lenguaje de toda la tierra’ [For this reason was it called by the name Babel, because there Jehova confused the language of the all the earth]. It is worth noting in even this limited selection of translations, the number of names God has: the Lord, the Eternal, Jehova, YHWH. The next chapter looks at the impossibility of naming God and names of the impossible. What has actually happened in this English translation of Derrida’s text is the effacement of ambiguity. The phrase in the Chouraqui translation is ‘Sur quoi [la ville] il clame son nom: Bavel, Confusion.’ The son here could be ‘his’ or ‘its’ and Derrida plays with the undecideability of to whom this son belongs. Graham, on the other hand, decides on ‘his’. As Davis notes: ‘This reduction, however reasonable, obscures the process of the strong reading that Derrida gives the Babel story, which keeps the plurivocality of ‘Babel’ as the name of both the city and of God in play, and thus demonstrates the impossibility of language naming an identity that exists before or outside context.’ (Davis p. 11).
130.
130. DTB p. 214 /trans. p. 170 See also OA p. 135–6 /trans. p. 101.
131.
131. DTB p. 211 /trans. p. 167.
132.
132. OA p. 136 /trans. p. 101.
133.
133. DTB p. 213 /trans. p. 169.
134.
134. See Lapidot op.cit.
135.
135. Lapidot p. 101.
136.
136. Davis, p. 12.
137.
137. Davis p. 42.
138.
138. OA p. 136 /trans. p. 101.
139.
139. DTB p. 214 /trans. p. 170.
140.
140. OA p. 136 /trans. p. 102.
141.
141. OA p. 137 /trans. p. 102.
142.
142. Patrick Mahony in Derrida OA p. 129 /trans. p. 96 Mahony’s extended question takes place in the Freudian framework in relation to transference/translation and Derrida’s neologism tranche-fert which is a play on the psychoanalytical term transfert—‘transference’, see OA pp. 127–46 /trans. pp. 94–110.
143.
143. OA p. 141 /trans. p. 106.
144.
144. OA p. 142 /trans. p. 107 See also DG p. 162 /trans. p. 110.
145.
145. OA p. 142 /trans. p. 107 See also DTB p. 248 /trans. p. 205.
146.
146. OA p. 142 /trans. p. 107.
147.
147. OA p. 142 /trans. p. 107.
148.
148. OA p. 142–3 /trans. p. 107 The issue of being sent ‘off course’ and its relation with psychoanalysis was explored in Derrida’s La Carte Postale: de Socrate à Freud et au-delà (Paris: Flammarion, 1980) trans. by Alan Bass The Postcard: From Socrates to Freud and Beyond (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987). Christopher Norris in commenting on this work notes: ‘In La Carte postale Derrida will play all manner of inventive games with this idea of the two postal ‘systems’, the one maintaining an efficient service (with the law and police on hand if required), while the other opens up a fabulous realm of messages and meanings that circulate beyond any assurance of authorized control. […] there always comes a point where meaning veers off into detours unreckoned with on thematic (or indeed allegorical) terms.’ [Christopher Norris, Derrida (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1988) p. 116] These two ‘postal systems’ are always operative together and at the same time—the address or the proper name function precisely because they are always under the threat of not functioning. Their functioning can never be described as pure.
149.
149. Survivre p. 139 /trans. p. 78: ‘I shall not say that Blanchot offers a representation, a mise en scène of this demand for narrative, in La folie du jour: it would be better to say that it is there to be read, ‘to the point of de lire ium’, as it throws the reader off the track.’
150.
150. OA p. 137 /trans. p. 103.
151.
151. OA pp. 138–9 /trans. p. 104.
152.
152. Antoine Berman ‘La Traduction comme épreuve de l’étranger,’ Texte (1985) pp. 67–81, Trans. by Lawrence Venuti ‘Translation and the Trials of the Foreign’ in Lawrence Venuti (ed.) The Translation Studies Reader (London, New York: Routledge, 2000) pp. 284–297 [hereafter Berman].
153.
153. DTB p. 216 /trans. p. 172.
154.
154. Roman Jakobson ‘On Linguistic Aspects of Translation’, 1st published in 1959 reprinted in Lawrence Venuti (ed.) The Translation Studies Reader (London, New York: Routledge, 2000) pp. 113–118 [Hereafter Jakobson] p. 114.
155.
155. Jakobson p. 114.
156.
156. DTB p. 217 /trans. p. 173.
157.
157. DTB p. 218 /trans. p .174 For more on Derrida’s reading of Jakobson see ‘Linguistics and Grammatology’ in DG pp. 42–108 /trans. pp27–73 in particular see pp. 78–80 /trans. pp. 53–55 where Derrida interrogates Jakobson’s notion of writing as ‘parasitic’ upon speech.
158.
158. Jakobson p. 114 cited by Derrida DTB p. 217 /trans. p. 173.
159.
159. Jakobson p. 114 cited by Derrida DTB p. 217 /trans. p. 173.
160.
160. Davis pp. 28–9.
161.
161. DTB pp. 217–8 /trans. p. 174.
162.
162. Apories p. 28 /trans. p. 10.
163.
163. DTB p. 219 /trans. p. 175.
164.
164. Diss. p. 100 /trans. p. 93 (my italics).
165.
165. The conference took place in Cerisy-la-Salle in July 1992. (Apories p. 11 /trans. p.ix) The conference title, its ‘proper name’, could be translated in a myriad of ways: ‘The passage/crossing/changeover of borders/frontiers (around about/at the turns of [autour also sounds like aux tours—at the tower(s)/turn(s)] of Jacques Derrida’.
166.
166. Apories p. 26 /trans. p. 8.
167.
167. Apories pp. 27–8 /trans. pp. 9–10.
168.
168. Apories p. 28 /trans. p. 10.
169.
169. Apories pp. 26–7 /trans. p. 9.
170.
170. Apories p. 27 /trans. p. 9.
171.
171. DTB p. 215 /trans. p. 171 Derrida does not detail exactly what or whose translation theory he is discussing here. As he often does he describes it only generally as a ‘certain understanding of translation’ in the way he often comments on a ‘certain understanding of reading’. This ‘certain understanding of translation’ Derrida describes as ‘the transfer of meaning or a truth from one language to another without any essential harm being done.’ (OA p. 159 /trans. p. 120) Davis notes that this concept of unproblematic transfer of meaning is indeed that ‘which has historically dominated discussions of translation theory.’ While she notes exceptions to this rule are to be found in the Middle ages, in particular in the writings of Augustine, she highlights ‘such medieval theory, which accepted the arbitrary nature of ‘fallen’ human language, also rested upon the notion of an ultimate, divine truth, existent if not fully knowable. Like the philosophy of Plato, it subscribed to a metaphysics of presence.’ (Davis p. 18) Translation theory in recent years, however, seems to have undergone a dramatic shift away from this paradigm. What is most interesting about this shift, however, is that Davis links it specifically with the impact of Derrida’s work. The proponents of a more subtle understanding of translation theory—Rosemary Arrojo or Lawrence Venuti for example—do not subscribe to the idea of unproblematic transfer and are ‘most notably those sensitive to deconstruction.’ (Davis p. 91) See for example Arrojo ‘The Revision of the Traditional Gap Between Theory and Practice and the Empowerment of Translation in Postmodern Times’ in The Translator Vol. 4 No. 1 (1998) pp. 25–48 or Venuti The Scandals of Translation: Towards an Ethics of Difference (New York: Routledge, 1998).
172.
172. Benjamin p. 64 /trans. pp. 77–8.
173.
173. OA p. 134 /trans. p. 100.
174.
174. OA p. 132 /trans. p. 98.
175.
175. James Joyce Finnegan’s Wake (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) p. 258 [my emphasis] Finnegan’s Wake as a whole could be read as a performance of the Babelian event and it continuously references the Babel narrative—one of the principle characters, for example, is ‘Shem the Penman’. Joyce was also a theme in Derrida’s Introduction where he compares Husserl and Joyce under the rubric of translatability and ‘anti-historicism’ (Introduction pp. 104–106 /trans. pp. 102–104). His two essays on Joyce are published together in Ulysse gramophone: deux mots pour Joyce (Paris: Galilée, 1987). An extended discussion of the phrase ‘he war’ from Finnegan’s Wake along with what Derrida terms ‘the Joyce software today, joyceware’ takes place in ‘Two Words for Joyce’ [trans. by Geoffrey Bennington in Derek Attridge & Daniel Ferrer (eds.) Post-structuralist Joyce: Essays from the French (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984)]. In ‘Ulysses Gramophone Hear Say Yes in Joyce’ [trans. by Tina Kendall & Shari Benstock in Derek Attridge (ed.) Acts of Literature (London: Routledge, 1992) pp. 253–309] Derrida examines occurrences of the telephone in Ulysses to describe a type of ‘pre-original yes’.
176.
176. OA p. 133 /trans. p. 99.
177.
177. OA p. 133 /trans. p. 99.
178.
178. OA p. 134 /trans. p. 100.
179.
179. Apories p. 28 /trans. p. 10.
180.
180. Apories p. 30 /trans. p. 11.

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Philosophical Studies, Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK
Lisa Foran

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Foran, L. (2016). 4 Derrida and Translation. In: Derrida, the Subject and the Other. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57758-0_5

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