Piecing Together the Fragments: Translating Classical Verse, Creating Contemporary Poetry(Classical Presences)

In Piecing Together the Fragments, translator and poet Josephine Balmer examines the art of classical translation from the perspective of the practitioner. Positioning her study within the long tradition of translator prefaces and introductions, Balmer argues that such statements should be considered as much a part of creative writing as literary theory. From translating Sappho and other classical women poets, as well as Catullus and Ovid, to her poetry collections inspired by classical literature, Balmer discusses her relationship with her source texts and uncovers the various strategies and approaches she has employed in their transformations into English. In particular, she reveals how the need for radical translation strategies in any rendition of classical texts into English can inspire the poet/translator to new poetic forms and approaches. Above all, she considers how, through the masks or personae of ancient voices, such works offer writers a means of expressing dangerous or difficult subject matter they might not otherwise have been able to broach. A unique study of the challenges and rewards of translating classical poetry, this volume explores radical new ways in which creativity and scholarship might overlap - and interact.

Table of Contents:
Preface Acknowledgements Part One: Classical Translation and Translator Statements 1: Hunting Down the Words: Classical Translator Statements from Catullus to Arthur Golding 2: Into the Modern Era: from George Chapman to Anne Carson 3: For Myne Owne Onely Exercise: Women Classical Translators Part Two: Classical Translation and Dead Languages 4: The Art of Absence 5: A Broken Voice Through the Silence: Sappho: Poems and Fragments Part Three: Classical Translation and Research 6: Uncovering a New Canon: Classical Women Poets I 7: Into Completion: Classical Women Poets II 8: Finding the Jokes: Catullus: Poems of Love and Hate Part Four: Translation and Creativity 9: Finding a Place to Hide: Chasing Catullus: Poems, Translations and Transgression 10: Fragmenting the Self: The Word for Sorrow In Conclusion: Breaking Down the Boundaries Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Josephine Balmer is a poet and translator. Her translations and collections include Sappho: Poems & Fragments (1982, 1986 & 1992), Classical Women Poets (1996), Catullus: Poems of Love and Hate (2204), Chasing Catullus (2004), and The Word for Sorrow (2009). A former Chair of the British Translators' Association and advisor to the British Centre for Literary Translation at the University of East Anglia, she has also written widely on poetry and classical translation for publications such as the Observer, the Independent on Sunday, the TLS, the New Statesman, and The Times.

Review :
provides a clear illustration of how the classics can still be alive and relevant for modern readers and creative writers. This book will be highly relevant to all those interested in any aspects of poetry, translation and the classics, and the intersection between them. This is a fascinating, instructive and eminently readable book, and an important contribution to reception and translation studies. It is also a wonderful introduction to the poetâs own poetry by the poet herself ... a star in her own right. Ground-breaking ... from a researcher who has long been a major player within translation studies ... should appeal to a wide audience within the creative writing and academic fields of classics and translation studies. This is an important book which establishes translation as a unique field of literary work, a work that combines learning, judgment, and creativity. Piecing Together the Fragments is a rich and thoughtful study, of use to anyone interested in time, words and people. In Piecing Together the Fragments Balmer composes a tour de force exemplification of the scholarly rigor that translation entails. Balmer breaks new ground: whereas translators of modern languages have written books on the subject of translation, translators of classical literature have not done so, until now.