A (Re)turn to the Source Text

Abstract

The source text is an unescapable part of any translation or translation process. Without source text, no translation. Yet it is only recently that scholars in the field of translation studies have begun exploring, theorizing, and conceptualizing the source text in a more systematic fashion. The present volume builds on and expands this work, exposing how source texts are never merely given but always constructed by translators and used for various purposes. The seven case studies, by researchers working in translation studies or at the intersection of translation studies and other disciplines, explore the role and function of the source text in journalistic translation, pseudotranslation, indirect translation, children’s literature, and biblical translation. The authors ask questions such as: How do translators turn specific texts into source texts? How do translators conceptualize their originals? How do source texts of the ‘same’ work change over time?