Commentary on a Translation – help sheet

Your commentary as a whole should answer the questions ‘What were your priorities when
translating this text?’ and ‘Why did you decide to translate it in this way?’

To answer this question, you might want to think about:

 Fidelity to the source – are you faithful to the source text? In what ways? Do you
translate the poetry/prose into poetry/prose? Do you try to keep the original word
order?
 Success of the target text (your translation) – in what ways do you think that your
translation is successful? What audience is it meant for? What does your text convey to
a modern reader?
 Creativity and experimentation – is there anything creative about your translation? Why
did you decide to include this? How does this help you to translate the text?
 Other translations – how do your translation decisions compare to other people’s
translation decisions? Why did you decide on yours?
 Translation theory – does your translation of the text fit into any particular theoretical
mode? Did using theories of translation help you to decide how to translate the text?
 Secondary critical work - how does your translation fit with the secondary critical
material? Are there any particular articles you agree with and have tried to convey in
your translation? Are there any articles you disagree with and are going against in your
translation?

Your commentary should have:

 an introduction, broadly laying out why you have decided to translate the text in this
way [e.g. ‘My translation of ‘The Wife’s Lament’ is motivated by my belief, supported in
X’s article, that the narrator of the poem is speaking from beyond the grave’; ‘I have
translated The Wife’s Lament into rhyming verse to keep the text as a poetic text’ etc.]
You may want to focus on one particular aspect of your translation, or state two key
points
 references to secondary critical articles to back up your statements about translation
and the original text
 references to other translations of the text and an explanation of why your text is
similar to or different from them
 A conclusion, explaining your answers to the questions - ‘What were your priorities
when translating this text?’ and ‘Why did you decide to translate it in this way?’