A comparative account of the French and the English versions of one Beckett's text

Résumé du document

Translation is usually studied from another language to ours, in order to consider changes that have to be made. With Samuel Beckett, it is interesting to analyze the process of translation from French, which is not his mother tongue, to English. In fact, Beckett was, in the 50's, one of the rare bilingual authors. In the case of Samuel Beckett, translation was a way both to begin and to continue the writing process, a way for him to explore the relation of writing to language. Translation provides Beckett with the possibility of writing across languages. He sets out to resist assimilation to any cultural context: he is not exclusively anything-neither just an ‘Irish' writer nor just a ‘French' one. He chose French as his writing language for many works in order to shake off the stylistic accretions and tics that he had accrued in English, and translated them himself, which is the interesting point of this essay. To the question “why did you choose French?” he answered “pour faire remarquer moi “(to put myself forward). As if he wanted to show that French written by an English person is very different from French written by a French man. Words change meaning as a distorting mirror. The process of auto-translation is a real re-writing of each text that leads to the question of fidelity.

Extraits

[...] Si la vie y vient à manquer, je le sentirai. Je veux seulement savoir, de celui qui y fait de si bons débuts, avant de l'abandonner (Malone meurt) All I ask is that the last of mine, as long as it lasts, should have living for its theme. That's all. If it begins to run short of life I shall feel it. All I ask (Malone dies) In the same way, the description that Malone makes about his coat contains many plays on words in the original version. [...]

[...] However it is not always so easy and sometimes transformations are required: l'appelait l'Anglais, quoiqu'il fût loin de l'être, peut être parce qu'il s'exprimait en anglais de temps en temps (Malone meurt) He was called the Saxon, though he was far from being any such (Malone Dies) The transformation here is on the name given to the character and on the origin of this name. The situation is autobiographical because Beckett could be mixed up with an English man because he spoke English whereas he was Irish. Beckett –translator also deletes weaknesses in order to transform negative in positive in the English version. He reduces solitude: tout ça est faux. [...]

[...] Brian Fitch, in his study of Beckett's auto –translation, underlines the differences between classical translation and auto –translation. The writer –translator writes knowing the meaning and the context of his text, which leads to a more faithful translation than one done by a classical translator. The liberty taken by Beckett leads to differences noticeable in the two texts. Differences of use of humor and auto-derision are important in the texts. Firstly, puns based on phonetics can be found on the two versions but under different aspects. [...]

[...] (Malone meurt) are now in the House of Saint John of God. Fear nothing, you are among friends. Take no thought for anything, it is we shall think and act for you, from now forward [ ] Stunned by this torrent of civility, for he had eluded charity all his days, Macmann did not immediately grasp that he was being spoken (Malone Dies) The search of similarity by Beckett appears in the style as well. The author always tries to product the same effect on the French and the English readers. [...]

[...] Two English and French - are present, within each version separately, as well as within this composite work Malone meurt/ Malone Dies constituted by the two versions of the text taken together. The bilingual texts are inaccurate reflection one to each other. Critics notice that the French texts are generally more informal than the ones directly written in English. Because of these lexical differences, translation must present a huger liberty and a talent of creativity from the translator. Bibliography Beckett, Samuel. Malone meurt. Les Editions de Minuit Beckett, Samuel. Malone dies. [...]