Interrupted Flows and Delayed Transfers in Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire’s ‘One-way’ Translation of ‘Susu’

Abstract

Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire’s short story ‘Susu’ was published simultaneously in English and Rukiga versions, the flows (of water/urine, electricity, traffic, money transfers, phone credit) in the story providing a metaphor for the process of translation. Yet the Rukiga and English versions are not simply transfers, so that translation is understood as being similar to a change in taxi line, a credit transfer or an electrical charge flowing from one device to another. Instead the story does exactly the opposite, showing that translation and circulation of texts are processes that are always blocked, interrupted, impeded and obstructed. Thus the commentaries on African urban modernity and its discontents are mapped onto discussions about circulation of texts and bodies.