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Interpretation as the Underlying Force in Translation

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 Interpretation as the Underlying Force in Translation
Shah Ahmed*

Abstract
Translation Studies as an academic discipline was established in the 20 th century but
theorizing on Translation has been an old practice. From the antiquity to the modern era,
translation theory has undergone many changes and evolved through a good many debates.
But the elemental debate between translation and interpretation has been creating a great
deal of confusion in translation theories since the time of Marcus Tullius Cicero to our own
time. The two terms are, to many theorists, onomastically different but indissoluble in the
translational process. Again there are many critics who view translation and interpretation
as different to each other both experientially and practically. This paper aims at taking a true
look at this controversy in translation theories, and provides some clarification of what
‘translation’ and ‘interpretation’ actually mean. The paper will then present the similarities
and differences between these two terms from a critical perspective and establish the fact
that despite the apparent differences between the terms, interpretation is an underlying force
in the translation process. Out of many varieties of translation the paper refers to literary
translation: the translation of literary works.
The closing years of the twentieth century marked the consolidation of the
fledgling discipline known as Translation Studies. In the penultimate decade of the
century this subject began to be taken seriously and interest in the theory and
practice of translation grew steadily. Finally in the 1990s, Translation Studies came
to be an academic discipline, at once at international and interdisciplinary levels.
Once it was perceived as a marginal activity, but nowadays translation has begun to
be seen as a fundamental act of human exchange (Choudhury 4). The need to view
translation studies as an academic discipline was in embryonic state since the time
of Cicero (106-43 BC) and St Jerome (342-420). It was largely done by the works
of James S. Holmes (1924-1986) through which the translation studies became an
active field of engagement. The term “Translation Studies” was taken from his
paper “The Name and Nature of Translation Studies” (Hatim and Munday 7).
Holmes’s paper is “generally accepted as the founding statement for the field”
(Venuti, Translation 92). Until the sixteenth century translation remained mostly
attached to theology. Later on, a rapid growth of theories, especially as evidenced
by the proliferation of translators worldwide led this field to be included as branch
of knowledge. Translation has become a phenomenon that has a huge effect
on everyday life. As Hatim and Munday suggest:
Translation between written languages remains today the core of
translation research but the focus has been broadened far beyond the mere
replacement of SL linguistics items with their TL equivalents. In the
intervening years, research has been undertaken into all types of
linguistics, cultural and ideological phenomena around translation. (Hatim
and Munday 06)

*Lecturer, Department of English, Metropolitan University, Sylhet

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 The map of translation theories with its centres and peripheries, admissions and
exclusion reflects the current fragmentation of the field into sub-specialties, some
empirically oriented, some hermeneutic and literary, and some influenced by
various forms of linguistics and cultural studies which have resulted in productive
syntheses. But translation of literary works has always been considered one of the
highest forms of translation as it involves so much more than simply translating a
text. A literary translator must be also capable of translating feelings, cultural
nuances, humor and other subtle elements of a piece of work. Thus, the
interpretation of the text has turned to be very crucial in translation process. From
the ancient time, dynamic equivalence, i.e. the sense-for-sense or free translation
has been given a preference to formal equivalence, i.e. the word-for-word or literal
translation. Translation demands “equivalence from the point message, not from
word or sentence level” (Shuttle and Cowie 188). And dynamic translation seems to
be almost impossible without interpreting the text.
Wolfgang Iser (1926) and E. D. Hirsch Jr (1928) have brought the tradition of
hermeneutics (the technique, study or theory of interpretation) to the fore. Hirsch’s
book Validity in Translation introduced the theory of perspectivism, the theory that
interpretation varies with the standpoint of the interpreter. He argues “the meaning
of literary text is objectively knowable and distinguishable from the significance
attributed to that meaning by particular readers” (Lodge and Wood 230). Lawrence
Venuti (1953) coined a term “Domesticating Translation” by which he signifies a
translation strategy in which a transparent, fluent style is adopted in order to
minimize the foreignness of an ST. The translators should, he urges, get rid of
“Foreignization” i.e. “the alien features of an ST” (Hatim and Munday 338-39).
These are the factors that have raised emphasis in the study of interpretation
(Hermeneutics). In the endeavor of domesticating translation, the translator cannot
help adopting an interpretative approach. But a lot of theorists and critics put aside
interpretation as an oral performance. Some say that without interpretation true
translation is impossible, again some hold that translation is not interpretation:
translation involves written texts while interpretation oral communication.
Before establishing the interrelationship between translation and interpretation it
is necessary to properly understand the meaning of the two terms, their scope and
nature to shed adequate light on the debate. Translation Studies, according to
Roman Jacobson deals with three categories of translation: interlingual translation,
intralingual translation and intersemiotic translation. He says “it is interlingual
translation that is translation proper” (Jacobson 114). Interlingual literary
translation thus receives more attention for translation theorists than the other two.
Interlingual translation needs to incorporate interpretation in its process. To speak
generally, translation is the transference of a message of one language to another. In
other words, translation is a process through which the translator decodes source
language (SL) and encodes his/her understanding of the target language (TL) form.
Walter Benjamin points out that translations demonstrate “the central reciprocal
relationship between languages” and “the kinship of languages” (16-17). He
compares the SL text with ‘life’ and the translated text to ‘afterlife’: translation is

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the ‘flowering’ of any text that marks it with ‘continued life’ (16-17). Before we
embark upon the debate whether the translational process incorporates
interpretation, we need to work out an acceptable definition of translation. Oxford
Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (OALD) and American Heritage Dictionary (AHD)
define translation and translator in this way:
Translation: 1. The act or process of translating, esp. from one language
to another. 2. A translated version of a text.
Translator: 1. One who translates, esp. one professionally employed to
translate written works. 2. An interpreter. (AHD 1287-88)
Translation: 1. The activity of translating (Translate: to change something
spoken or especially written into another language. 2. A text or word that
is translated.
Translator: a person who translates writing or speech, esp. as a job.
(OALD 1270-71)
Both of the dictionaries define translation as a process as well as a product. But the
problem arises when we see AHD considers translator and interpreter as synonyms.
“The potential confusion of translation with interpreting” (Hatim and Munday 04)
poses the necessity for this debate to be dealt with to ascertain to what extent they
pair together or fall distant from each other. There are, according to Venuti, many
theorists who “have assumed a hermeneutic concept of language as interpretation,
constitutive of thought and meaning, where meanings shape reality […]”
(Translation 06). Are translators and interpreters then synonymous? The Dictionary
of Translation Studies forwards a relationship between the two terms (emphasis
added):
Translation: An incredibly broad notion which can be understood in many
different ways. For example, one may talk of translation as a process or a
product, and identify such sub-types as literary translation, technical
translation and machine translation; moreover, while more typically it just
refers to the transfer of written texts, the term sometimes also includes
interpreting. (Shuttleworth and Cowie 181)
The question “Does translation really include interpreting?” is actually a
debatable one. No translation is possible without interpretation vs translation is not
interpretation: translation is written material; interpretation is speaking is a long-
standing controversy in Translation Studies. In an endeavour to tone down this
controversy it necessitates deriving an unambiguous concept of interpretation from
the dictionaries:
Interpret: 1. to explain to oneself the meaning of: Elucidate. 2. to
expound the significance of. 3. to represent or render the meaning of esp.
through artistic performance 4. to offer an explanation. 5. to serve as an
interpreter of speakers of different language.

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 Interpretation: 1. the act, process or result of interpreting; explanation. 2.
A representation of the meaning of a work of art as expressed esp. in
representation or performance (AHD 671).
Interpret: 1(a). To explain what sth means. 2. to understand sth; to decide
the meaning or purpose of sth.3. to hear sth in one language and
immediately translate it aloud into another.
Interpretation: (a) the action or process of interpreting sth. (b) an
explanation or meaning (OALD 624)
From the definitions now a question logically comes up: how far is interpretation
oral? It turns up from the definitions that translation is interrelated with
interpretation. It is a practice in lexicography to enter the meaning of a word in
hierarchy from the most important to the least. Both dictionaries clarify that though
interpretation is related to oral performance, its primary role is to explain,
understand, and perform artistically and ingeniously. The definitions accentuate
interpretation as a course of action in translation. The translators first determine the
meaning of the SL through interpretative introspection, and then they proceed to
realize the meaning in their translation.
Interpreting may be seen as a different process from translating when it is
assigned to only oral communication. Even though translators and interpreters are
seen sometimes professionally different in translating written text and interpreting
oral speech, it cannot be denied that they have a great deal in common with each
other. Both translators and interpreters must have a desire to know more about the
people and culture of TL and try to have firsthand knowledge of how those people
think and behave. To have the best interpretation and translation possible they both
need to enunciate their tasks in their native tongue. Both require being bilingually
proficient in the TL and SL. Both need to be aware of what is going on in their
specialty fields in order to translate accurately because a language evolves and
changes on a daily basis. Both of them work as go-betweens: the interpreter
understands the speaker’s utterance and gets it across to the listeners, while the
translator internalizes the SL and gets it across to his native language readers.
“Interpreting, just like translation, is, fundamentally, the art of paraphrasing” (RIC
03). Just as we cannot explain to someone a thought if we did not fully understand
that thought, in the same way, we cannot translate or interpret something without a
mastery of the subject being relayed. Both interpreting and translating presuppose a
certain level of proficiency and skill in more than one language. It is seen, though
not always, that they work out of a nationalistic fervor and zeal: they try to intimate
their native readers with the masterworks of the foreign writers or thinkers.
Resemblances apart, a great number of critics are disinclined to incorporate
interpretation in the translating process. They balk at the interrelationship
demarcating interpretation is only oral and translation written. This creates a long
standing confusion in Translation Studies. The confusion is dilated by Dominik
Kreutzer who, in Glossary of Translation and Interpreting Terminology, demarcates
interpretation as “the act of rendering spoken words from one language into
another” specifying it as “simultaneous interpreting” and “consecutive

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interpreting.” Both terms signify interpreting “while the speaker is speaking” or
“when the speaker has finished speaking or pauses for interpreting” (88). Before
defining interpretation as an oral feat, he should have brought into his consideration
at least the critical interpretative analyses of literary works. Without interpretative
analysis any work hardly survives beyond its time and place. Interpretative critical
essays determine the status of any work of both intellectual and literary level raising
or reducing its acceptability. If interpretation is thus set aside as irrelevant to the
translational process, on what basis do many critical books on a single text come
into being in criticism or appreciation? The answer can be derived from the
definitions by the dictionaries which see interpretation as explaining, expounding,
elucidating, understanding or deciding the meaning of the text. Pragmatically
speaking, no one can translate if he/she does not interpret the meaning of the SL
text to him/herself.
Many theorists like Dominik Kreutzer place interpretation in a narrow bind. In
most cases, they hold, the interpreter expresses himself vocally while a translator
performs his work on paper for publication. Munday sets aside the translation-
interpretation debate suggesting that interpretation is oral translation and focuses
on written translation instead. He is reluctant to integrate interpretation with
translation (Munday 04). Hatim and Munday appear to baulk at incorporating
interpretation with translation: they restrict translation to “conventional written
translation” and exclude interpretation as “oral translation of a spoken message or
text” (Hatim and Munday 4-6). Not unlike them many a translator holds that
translation is written – it involves taking a written text (such as a book or an article)
and translating it into the target language. Interpretation, quite the reverse, is oral –
it refers to listening to something spoken (a speech or phone conversation) which is
orally interpreted in the target language. So translators are writers par excellence,
while the interpreters possess superior oral communication skills. Most of the
differences they find come from their conclusion that translation is written and
interpretation is spoken. As a result, they view that interpretation is simultaneous
transfer of one language to another: it occurs in real time, in the physical, televised
or telephonic presence of the parties for whom the interpreter renders an
interpretation. Translation is out of time: it refers to the translation from one
language to another of something which is frozen in time: a book, a letter, a play, or
a recorded speech that the original writer or speaker already finished. It is also held
that translation is produced and delivered as “a whole product” and interpretation
does trigger off this “whole product” as there is “immense time pressure”
(Lindholm 3).
Critics put across the idea that translation includes interpretation in the sense that
both of these process transfer one language to another, but the distinction becomes
sharp in performance. If we agree on their views, the activities of the translator
seem to be complex and compressive. Translators carry out converting one
language to another so that the TL can convey the intended message in SL.
Interpreters, on the other hand, are much freer: he can drop out some unimportant
account of the speaker. He concentrates on words of the speaker. It is true that the
difference between the two terms in skills, training, aptitude, and even in

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knowledge is so substantial that a man, in a professional level, can hardly be a
successful translator and interpreter at the same time. But this difference can be
minimized when the process of interpretation transcends the “only oral” and entails
literary translation.
As written interpretation of literary works is in fashion, the line of determining
the above difference between interpretation and translation appears to be
ungrounded. Unfortunately, most of the theorists who brush aside interpretation as
oral translation, hardly realize that interpreting is not only an oral performance but
also a written one of written texts. They must have either ignored or forgotten to
entail interpretation in the process of translation. Susan Bassnett aptly expresses
her grudging reaction when she sees some critics ignore the task of interpreters in
translation:
It is therefore foolish to argue that the task of the translator is to translate but
not to interpret, as if the two were separate exercises. The interlingual
translation is bound to reflect the translator’s own creative interpretation of
the SL text. (83)
She strongly disagrees with Longfellow when the latter declares in the preface of
translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy, “the business of a translator is to report what
the author says, not to explain what he means […]” (Qtd in Bassnett 73).
Longfellow’s extraordinary views on translation take the literalist position to
extremes.
The translation vs interpretation debate can be further simplified if we look at
how interpretation has been defined in Translation Glossary:
Interpretation is the process of determining the meaning of something
spoken or written. In particular we are concerned with discovering the
meaning of the text before we translate it […]. Any true translation first
requires interpretation of the source text, that is, an answer to the question,
“What does this passage mean?” This is interpretation which is necessary.
(Leman 06)
It is clear that translation and interpretation are complementary to each other.
Wolfgang Iser holds that the translators should apply “deduction” and “induction”
that “give rise to the configurative meaning of the text” (197-198). The deduction-
and-induction method necessitates interpretation. Iser also acknowledges the
interplay between translation and interpretation resulting in a newer emphasis. He
says that the interplay helps the translator realize what is impalpable in the TL:
Since this interplay obviously does not take place in the text itself, but can
only come into being through the process of reading, we may conclude that
this process formulates something that is unformulated in the text, and yet
represents its intention. (Lodge and Wood 199)
Translators first determine the meaning of the SL through an interpretative
introspection, and then they proceed to realize the meaning in their translation. It is,
therefore, to consider translation as written and interpretation as oral, the truth is so

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obvious that the fallacy cannot be foisted upon the students of Translation Studies.
To a close examination, interpretation appears to be like an undergarment or an
interior design of translation in rendering it spruce, articulate and elegant. The
theorists who close their eyes to the role of interpretation in translation perhaps pin
their faith on the old premise which embraces the idea that a translation should
follow the original text exactly like a shadow which follows the original object. But
analyzing translation as a ‘shadow’ of the original G. Gopinathan explains in simple
terms:
As a shadow can differ from its original object, depending on the intensity
and the angle of light falling on it, a translation may also have a different
form depending on the nature of light thrown on it by the translator by his
interpretation. (05)
In narrowing the role of interpenetration in the process of translation critics do
not realize the true task of interpreter. A translator’s task is not a simple
transference of meaning from the SL to TL, he/she also has to interpret the text
and should have a clear idea of the author, his/her intention, standpoint, social
milieu, and the context into which the text or utterance is revealed. Aiwei Shi in his
“Hermeneutics and Translation Theory” points out:
Translation theory was once strictly confined within the scope of
linguistics for translation was merely referred to as a conversion of
languages, from the source language into the target language.
Nevertheless, when research is carried further and deeper, meaning is
found not only associated with the language or the text but also the author
and the reader, which form the tripartite in understanding of the
appropriate meaning of any text. (01)
In a catechistical way he asks, “Why is hermeneutics relevant to translation?” He
also provides the answer, “there is no translation without understanding and
interpreting texts, which is the initial step in any kinds of translation including
literary translation of course” (01). Translation is basically an exchange of text the,
but when the translator takes on interpretation, the translation entails the author, the
text and the reader: a tripartite relationship. Without taking this tripartite, no
translation is lucid and cogent, and it persists in impenetrability. The interpreters, to
some extent, are like the New Historicists who argue that the best framework for
interpreting literature is to place it in its historical context, and see what
contemporaneous issues, anxieties, and struggles a literary work reflects, retracts, or
tries to work through. Here an interpreter performs the task of a critic with the
clarification that they inject their opinion if and when they need to make a statement
of their own. As Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan say, “Historical background,
historical context: the language of Historicism saw the literary work in the
foreground and history in the background, with the task of the critic (interpreter)
being to connect the two” (505). In other words, in interpretation, the texts or
words are construed within the context of the biography of the author and his social
background along with his philosophical perspective. As a result this shell-breaking

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interpretation enables the translator to penetrate the text and communicate with his
readers.
In the establishment of Translation Studies as an academic discipline, the force
of literal translation has been noticeably vitiated. Modern theorists place their
emphasis on dynamic equivalence of the SL or idiomatic translation. In both the
meaning of the original is translated into forms which most accurately and naturally
preserve the meaning of the original language in the common language of average
speakers. We can now close our eyes to Longfellow’s rationale that translation and
interpretation are two separate activities and, that it is the duty of the translator to
translate what is there and not to interpret. It is an obvious fallacy since every
reading is an interpretation. The translator reads and interprets to him/herself. Thus
the activities of translation cannot be separated. The raison d'être of interpretation is
to be sought in the subsistence of translation. James Holmes in his “Forms of Verse
Translation and the Translation of Verse” has devised the following constructive
diagram to illustrate the interrelationship between translation and critical
interpretation:

(Bassnett 101)
Verse translation rests on the axis point where the types of interpretation
crisscross with the types of imitation and derivation. All the translations, both verse
and prose, are tinged with the translator’s individual assessment of the text. Ezra
Pound (1885-1972) and Charles W. Kennedy (1936) made an effort to revive the
Anglo-Saxon poem, “The Seafarer” presumably written by Cynewulf. They both
get the message and interpret according to their own point of view with their
distinctive poetic predilection. Both stand against literal translation and alter the
text: Pound’s translation comprises 101 lines of the 108 lines of the poem, whilst
Kennedy’s translation is restricted to 65 lines. Kennedy interprets it from his
Christian point of view and allegorically passes the suffering of the seafarer on
Everyman. In an even greater shift, Pound’s translation focuses on the suffering of a
great individual rather than the common suffering of Everyman. Pound attempts to
show the individual in a world-system distanced in time, space and values.
Kennedy, on the other hand, strives to relate the Anglo-Saxon world to that of

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contemporary readers. These disparities in translators’ points of views manifest
some of the complexities involved in the translation where there is a gulf between
the SL and TL cultures through distance in time and space. No translation, it can be
concluded, is possible without the individual translator’s readings as well as
interpretations.
Interpretation sometimes becomes so manifest in translation that it comes to be
identified as interpretive translation, “a term used to refer to a translation which
includes interpretation of the meaning of the source text, rather than simply the
translation” (Leman 28). This idea of interpretative translation is held pejoratively
by those who prefer literal translation, especially in theological translations.
Interpretive use of language has been accepted worldwide as modern theorists no
more opt for word-for-word translation as an ideal process in the TL scenario.
Moreover, another type of translation i.e. Transcreation has been recently added to
translation theories. Transcreation is, as the term itself signifies, is not a dogged
transference of the SL; it is rather a sort of translation produced from of the ideas of
both the writer and translator. Here the translator subjectively surfaces himself
along with the thoughts of the SL author. The motive of Transcreation is ‘to
develop the “Swadesi” idea, to bring out the merits of the land and to resist the
cultural infiltration from the west and to bring the best from other literatures
(Gopinathan 06). Interpretive approach is executed comprehensively in translational
modus operandi as translator reflects his own understanding and considers the
understanding level of his/her readers. Why is a single text translated in different
ways by different translators? It is because each individual translator interprets the
text from individualistic point of view: the translator’s perspectivistic point of view
diversifies the translation of any text.. A valid interpretation is one that represents
an authentic realization of meaning through one’s own perspective, or through that
of one’s time and culture. It can be, therefore, said that all translations are
interpretation-ridden and all interpretations are perspective-ridden
Lindholm’s view that “translation is out of time; interpretation is in time” (03) is
disapproved when interpretation occurs out of time. If he were true, Shakespeare’s
The Tempest or Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe would not be given a colonial
interpretation in the 20th century. The eleventh century- Omar Khayyam was given
an interpretive translation by Edward Fitzgerald in the 19 th century. Fitzgerald’s
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (1859) was reinterpreted by Paramhansa
Yogananda in the twentieth century through his intralingual prose interpretation.
The latter’s explanatory edition was published in 1994, about 135s year after
Fitzgerald’s book. Quatrain 11 can serve here as an example. In Fitzgerald the lines
are:
Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness-
And Wilderness is Paradise enow. (Fitzgerald 25)

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In Paramhansa, the same lines read as:
Withdraw your life force into the center of the tree of life, the spine, and
bask there in the cool shade of inner peace. As the sensory tumult dies
away, drink the wine of bliss from the flask of your devotion. Commune
inwardly with your divine Beloved. And in the stillness, listen: For the
Singing Blessedness will satisfy your every heart’s desire and entertain
you forever with melodies of perfect wisdom. (Yogananda 49)
It is evident that whereas Fitzgerald interpreted Khayyam from a hedonistic point of
view, Yogananda’s interpretation enabled him to elucidate every rubai from his
idiosyncratically spiritual point of view. Interpretation is, in fact, not in time and
simultaneous response; not unlike translation, it occurs out of time.
Translation involves localization i.e. taking a product and making it
linguistically and culturally appropriate to the target locale. The written product that
results from the translation process functions in the socio-cultural context of the TL,
although the situation referred to by the SL message may be unknown in the TL
culture. In such cases translators have to take recourse to the process of adaptation
creating a new situation that can be considered equivalent. To set the importance of
localization and adaptation, Venuti in “How to Read a Translation”, adds his insight
citing from John Dryden’s preface to Aeneid: “I have endeavoured to make Virgil
speak such English as he would himself have spoken, if he had been born in
England, and in this present Age” (Venuti 01). It can never be possible for the
translator to localize, adapt or make the SL writer speak in the TL locale if he/she
does not first interpret the texts, etc to him/herself. Interpretation helps a translator
envisage and penetrate the content, language, message, reader, culture, religion or
social strata of the SL. In consequence the translated text earns perspicuity and the
translator virtuosity.
It has been previously mentioned that E. D. Hirsch Jr coined the term
perspectivism in his book Validity in Translation, which emphasizes that a
translator usually decodes a text and then encodes it mingling his/her own
perspective with that of the original writer. Many a theorist claims that much of the
original text is lost in the perspectivistic interpretation of the translator. But it is
absurd to think that the intermediate perspective i.e. the perspective of a translator,
can process the meaning of the original. This process simply helps the translator
elucidate the meaning to his/her TL readers. In interpretive translation the readers
can delight in exploring the creativity of the original writer as well as of the
translator. The text, of course, is respoken from the translator’s new perspective and
a new dimension in meaning can be formulated. “But a text”, as Hirsch makes out,
“cannot be interpreted from a perspective different from the original author’s. The
meaning is understood from the perspective that lends existence to meaning”
(Lodge and Wood 239). Hirsch’s implication is that translation is strengthened by
the perspectives of authors and the translators, and readers are entertained with a
“binocular vision” (240). This entertaining of two perspectives is called the
“doubling of personality” (240). Thus the translated text gathers force which makes

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it dynamically equivalent to the original. So it is an evasion to argue that the
translator’s alien perspective distorts the meaning of the original text.
The inseparability between translation and interpretation is but logical: the
process of translation cannot dispense with interpretation. Translation must be
interpretive if the translator’s aim is to educate, edify and provide his readers with
delight in keeping with the impact the original writer had upon his readers.
Translations should attain understandability to TL readers. Only a free or dynamic
approach and not a literal one can be efficacious and desirable. And the raison d'être
of dynamic translation is interpretation without which the translation is rendered
abstruse. If translators dispose of interpretation, translation becomes featureless,
insipid and moribund. How can a Bengali translator translate ‘Carry coal to
Newcastle’ to ‡Z‡j gv_vq †Zj †`Iqv, ‘it’s raining cats and dogs’ to gyljav‡i e„wó
n‡”Q, or ‘an Ethiopian can never change his skin’ to Kqjv ayB‡j gqjv hvq bv, if
he/she does interpret to him/herself what sense they actually refer to?

Interpretation is translation’s coherence with the TL culture and readers.

Coherence leaves translation fruitful and convincing to the TL readers. Shoshana
Blum-Kulka speaks of coherence and adds that if the translator throws coherence
away, the translation fails to gain lucidity in TL readers. He agrees with Edmondson
who “equates coherence with the text’s interpretability” (304). It has been pointed
out earlier in this paper that interpretation involves a ‘tripartite’ arrangement of the
author, the text and the reader which is also what New Historicism claims. Without
interpreting the ‘tripartite’ of the writer, the text and the reader, translation comes
out to be abortive. In many instances the words or phrases of SL happen to be
untranslatable to TL and in such cases the translators are supposed to consider the
range of TL words or phrases having regard to the presentation of class, status, age,
sex, society, religion, climate, etc of the SL writers. A translator is also to consider
writers’ relationship to their listeners and to the context of the meaning of SL. A
translator, in fact, has to take the question of interpretation into account in addition
to the problem of selecting a TL phrase which will have a roughly similar meaning.
Shakespeare’s sonnet “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day” cannot be
semantically translated into a language where summers are unpleasant, just as the
concept of God the Father cannot be translated into a language where the deity is
female (Bassnett 30). In such cases interpretation is the only channel through which
the communication between the SL and the TL flows fluently. We may take the
example of Suresh Ranjan Basak’s translation of Shakespeare’s sonnet ‘Shall I
Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day’:
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate

emš— w`‡bi mv‡_ gvbvq wK †Zvgvi Zzjbv?

Zvi †P‡q †Xi †ekx mygayi, g‡bvni Zzwg|. (Basak 12)
Summer (MÖx®§) in Bangladesh is not the summer in England. Shakespeare
chooses this pleasing season to let us see that his friend is more pleasing than even
the charms of English summer. Basak must have interpreted the fact and realized

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that the literal meaning of summer ‘MÖx®§’ would not serve the purpose of
rendering Shakespeare’s thought. Selim Sarowar renders it more dynamic when he
interprets Shakespeare’s ‘summer’s day’ in a synecdochical use of “‰ekvLx w`b”:
D¾¡j ‰ekvLx w`b, †Zvgvi Dcgv †m wK nq?
Zzwg †Zv my›`iZi, ZviI †P‡q K‡evò, gayi| (Qtd in Chowdhury 5)

Interpretation gives translation accessibility and ease of processing. We cannot

help cold-shouldering the approach that interpretation is only “a group of people
interaction” and that “interpretation is so unlike translation as to be an entirely
different proposition” (Lindholm 03). It is true that translation and interpretation are
separate processes, but this is only when we assign interpretation to verbal
exchange of language. Interpretation is by no means an exclusively different
trajectory to translation and their correlation cannot be denied in case of literary
interpretation. The translator reads and understands the SL text. A mere reading
and understanding cannot facilitate to represent the body of SL in his/her own
language. Interpretation continues till the end of translation process. Through the
interpretation the translator comes to know the context and reason of the writing,
objective and intention of the writer. Interpretation also helps the translator have the
ideas about the social, economic, religious and political status of the writer as well
as the readers at the time of writing. As a result he/she can decide the approach
(literal, free or transcreational) of translation he would pursue.
Seen partially as only an oral feat, interpretation cannot dissolve in the process
of translation. But in the interpretation of a written text translating and interpreting
are indissoluble. The interpretive commentary makes translation easy and direct. It
is only a surface and one-dimensional observation that the difference between
interpreting and translation is only the difference in the medium: the interpreter
translates orally, while a translator interprets written text. As a matter of fact
interpreting and translation are two closely related linguistic disciplines. Translator
first interprets, and then translates. It is impossible to imagine that any type of
translation can avoid a certain degree interpretation. In this sense, interpretation
gives translation the property of rhythm and persuasiveness. In the recreation of a
text, the process of interpretation acts like S.T. Coleridge’s Secondary
Imagination which “dissolves, diffuses, dissipates, in order to recreate; […] it
struggles to idealise and unify.” It gives the translator a "mysterious power," by
which he extracts "hidden ideas and meaning" from the linguistic symbols of the
TL. It is seen “co-existing with the conscious will” of the translator. Like the
secondary imagination of the poet, interpretation has an “esemplastic” to “shape
into one” and to “convey a new sense” (Coleridge 488-89). Interpretive translation
can only be associated with a literary translator with immense artistic genius. When
the translator dispenses with interpreting, he/she translates verbatim, and so it
becomes tedious and slapdash. In literary translation a text must lose its original
majesty, if its translator disposes of interpretation. Rabindranath Tagore is aptly
right when he opines that translation in different branches of literature is almost
impossible (Chowdhury 04). Translators can, nonetheless, leave a certain mark of

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possibility of literary translation if they endeavor it through the process of
interpretation.
To recapitulate briefly, however confusing the concepts of translating and
interpreting appear to be, no translation, especially free or dynamic one, is possible
without interpretation. It can be said that translation is the general term and
interpretation is a subset of translation, as diagrammatically illustrated:
Translation
Interpretation Translation
The line between the two terms are also blurred when we think of the translator,
poring over language A to understand exactly what is meant before translating into
language B; the translator must interpret the meaning before he/she can translate the
words. Another level is then added to the diagram:
Translation
Interpretation Translation
Interpret meaning Interpret meaning
Translate orally Translate in writing
The real distinction between translating and interpreting can be succinctly
expressed by saying that something that is not understandable or not understood is
interpreted so that it can be understood. After a piece of literature, painting, or
music is understood and interpreted, consciously or formally, it can be translated.
The translation of literary works must fall in the line of literary level. And it should
be remembered that no text can be rendered literary unless the translator penetrates
the text with his/her interpretative introspection.

Metropolitan University Journal17

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