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ABSTRACT
This article examines Carlo Emilio Gadda's translations of two Spanish texts from the Siglo de Oro. In the first section, by situating Gadda's translations in the context of the “rediscovery” of the Baroque in Italy, his work is presented as the result not only of his literary preferences and long acquaintance with Baroque literature, but also as the product of an activity that fully engages with its contemporary cultural system. In the second section, the goal is to read Gadda's translations through the lens of Umberto Eco's “open work”, a notion that stemmed in part from the same context of rediscovery of the Baroque in the 1950s.
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Notes
1 “ … c’è da pensare che tutte queste constatazioni vadano intese, appunto, entro l’ambito di uno stato di profonda e segreta relazione tra il Seicento e il Novecento”. Unless otherwise stated, all translations into English are mine.
2 “[Nella prospettiva barocca], il mondo è visto in movimento, con le cosiddette apparenze che non vi sono più, spiritualisticamente, manifestazioni di essenze, ma concrete realtà”.
3 For a more detailed analysis of the functions of the Baroque in postwar Italy see Benaglia Citation2015 and Citation2020.
4 “Il barocco e il grottesco albergano già nelle cose, nelle singole trovate di una fenomenologia a noi esterna: non [sono] ascrivibili a una premeditata volontà o tendenza espressiva dell’autore, ma legati alla nature e alla storia … ; talché il grido-parola d’ordine ‘barocco è il G. !’ potrebbe commutarsi nel più ragionevole e più pacato asserto ‘barocco è il mondo’, e il G. ne ha percepito e ritratto la baroccaggine”. Translated by Robert S. Dombroski.
5 The book is now in the “Fondo Gadda” at the Biblioteca teatrale di Burcardo.
6 During the 1930s and later, Bo was one of the most active introducers of foreign literature, especially French and Spanish, in Italy. He introduced in particular the Symbolist and Decadent poets of the late 19th century, such as Mallarmé and Baudelaire, whose poetics were criticized by Croce. On the correspondence between Bo and Gadda, see Venturi Citation2018.
7 In the original Italian. I am quoting the English translation (Eco Citation1989).
8 For a detailed analysis of these translations, see Benuzzi-Belliter (Citation2005, 5–30) and Vela (1993, 97–138).
9 See for example the footnote that Gadda adds to the name of Beelzebub, used by Quevedo to talk about a guard: “Balzebù, in certo senso, funziona da gendarme e carceriere dell’universo” (67) [Beelzebub, we could say, acts as the policeman and the jailer of the universe].
10 The original translation, used for this analysis, was published in 2003; see Vela’s (Citation1993a) reconstruction of the translation's publication. See also Vela Citation1993b.
11 “ … un fatto nela storia delle traduzioni probabilmente senza precendenti … , ma solo Gadda ha osato varcare, e i risultati sono stati cospicui, i limiti imposti da un certo mito di normalità”.
12 “La sicurezza degli autori spagnoli nel distinguere il bene dal male si è persa nelle traduzioni Italiane, dove protagonisti sono l’ambiguità e la dispersione”.
13 As in this sentence from El Mundo por de dentro: “y en el suelo obediente y cansado”, translated by Gadda as “E caddi, come sasso in un opaco lago” [and fell, as a stone in unclear lake] (93) which is reminiscent of the famous line of the Inferno “E caddi come corpo morto cade” [And fell, as a dead body falls].
14 The passage in Spanish reads: “ … y él, con prudentes razones,/ le propuso un casamiento”. Gadda's translation reads: “ … il suo adorato babbione che era venuto per proporle un casamiento, sì, un matrimonio”. The word casamiento is deleted in the 1957 censored version.
15 Ciriatto is one of the thirteen demons guarding the fifth bolgia of the Malebolge, in Dante's Inferno.
16 “ … la distinction entre la traduction-produit, redevable d’une approche statique, et la traduction-processus, qui fait justice à l’historicité du comprendre, de même qu’au potentiel énergétique des œuvres et des mots”.
17 “È possibile una teoria [del Barocco] che non sia una speculazione astratta … , ma che nasca da un’esperienza concreta della storia e delle opere, e nello stesso tempo, dal rilievo del significato del nuovo e tenace loro rivivere per noi, oggi?”
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Cecilia Benaglia
Cecilia Benaglia is an Assistant Professor of French and Italian at San Diego State University, California, USA. Her research interests include twentieth-century French, Francophone and Italian literature, translation and cultural transfer studies, sociology of literature and women's and gender studies. Her work has appeared in a variety of European and North American journals. Her first book, Engagements de la forme. Une sociolecture des oeuvres de Carlo Emilio Gadda et Claude Simon (Classiques Garnier), was published in 2020.