Translation in Caribbean Literature

Abstract

Abstract:This essay weaves together translation and postcolonial literary studies to propose a translational model of reading for Caribbean literature. Translation and creolization provide the conceptual and aesthetic lens for reading Caribbean literary texts: If translation is an apt model, since it captures languages in transit toward other languages and other contexts, creolization embodies the points of contact among what Naoki Sakai calls the "uncountable languages within the literary texts," unlocking novel ideas of language and literature. The essay offers "translational reading" of texts by Derek Walcott, Velma Pollard, and Dionne Brand as an alternative to the traditionally monolingual model of reading.