The Colombian Lettered City-Philology, Ideology, Translation

Abstract

This book foregrounds the role of cultural translation in the formation of Colombia’s literary and political field. By translation, I mean primarily the semantic transfers that take place between the source and target languages involved in the related processes of semiotic decoding and recoding. Translated texts can be antiquated or modernized versions of the original, and they can also be foreignized or naturalized as they become part of the translator’s national repertoire. The main author under study, Miguel Antonio Caro (1843–1909), admitted to preferring the production of archaicizing/antiquating texts in the target language because they were etymologically more trustworthy and they revealed the unity of the Spanish language. In addition, they had a kinship with Latin and they illustrated Church doctrine. Andrés Bello and the Spaniard José Gómez Hermosilla, by contrast, favored (so they claimed) a more contemporary register, thereby encouraging more meaningful cultural transfers with their immediate surroundings.