Virginia Woolf in Arabic: A Feminist Paratextual Reading of Translation Strategies

Abstract

This chapter offers a feminist critique of the strategies used in translating Virginia Woolf’s work into Arabic. The study examines the representation of Woolf in Egypt and the Arab World, detailing the shift from emphasis on Woolf as a modernist novelist to a feminist writer. It begins with a historical overview of Woolf’s works translated into Arabic since the 1960s, followed by a discussion of the critical approaches to the translated texts from a feminist perspective, with particular emphasis on the significance of a paratextual analysis. The last section is devoted to examining A Room of One’s Own (1929) as a case study of the translation of Woolf into Arabic. The chapter ends by highlighting the ethical dimensions embedded in the translation strategies related to Virginia Woolf and feminist texts in general.