Images of Irreverence: Nonsense Poetry in Translation as Exemplified by Edward Lear’s Poem “The Akond of Swat”
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RIS BIB ENDNOTEImages of Irreverence: Nonsense Poetry in Translation as Exemplified by Edward Lear’s Poem “The Akond of Swat”
Publication date: 30.12.2022
Przekładaniec, Issues in English, Special Issue 2022 – Translating Genre Literature, pp. 144 - 178
https://doi.org/10.4467/16891864ePC.22.007.16521Authors
Images of Irreverence: Nonsense Poetry in Translation as Exemplified by Edward Lear’s Poem “The Akond of Swat”
This article discusses selected “rewritings” of Edward Lear’s nonsense poem “The Akond of Swat”, focusing specifically on the translators’, illustrators’, adapters’ and editors’ attitudes towards the allusive nature of the poem – and specifically the reference it makes to the historical figure of the Pashtun religious leader Abdul Ghaffūr, also known as the Akond (or Wali) of Swat or Saidū Bābā, which may be viewed as orientalist or parodistic from a contemporary viewpoint. Recent translated and illustrated versions of the poem inscribe it with new aesthetic and ideological values. Two Polish translations considered in this article, produced by Andrzej Nowicki and Stanisław Barańczak respectively, demonstrate changing approaches to the nonsense genre evidenced in Polish literary circles (revealing a gradual transition from pure to parodistic nonsense). Graphic representations of the poem discussed in the article testify to the artists’ interpretive powers in redefining the genre of Lear’s poem, rebranding it as an infantile fairy tale on the one hand and a disturbing reflection on tyranny and “the war on terrorism” on the other.
Trans. by Agata Hołobut
* Originally published in Polish in “Przekładaniec” vol. 40/2020. Open access for this publication has been supported by a grant from the Priority Research Area Heritage under the Strategic Programme Excellence Initiative at Jagiellonian University.
See: https://doi.org/10.4467/16891864PC.20.010.13173
Source texts
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Information: Przekładaniec, Issues in English, Special Issue 2022 – Translating Genre Literature, pp. 144 - 178
Article type: Original article
Titles:
Images of Irreverence: Nonsense Poetry in Translation as Exemplified by Edward Lear’s Poem “The Akond of Swat”
Images of Irreverence: Nonsense Poetry in Translation as Exemplified by Edward Lear’s Poem “The Akond of Swat”
Uniwersytet Jagielloński w Krakowie
Poland
Published at: 30.12.2022
Article status: Open
Licence: CC BY
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