Literary Translation among the languages of the Spanish State: the case of Basque
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Traduction : Mikel Morris
With the subject being translations between the languages of this Peninsula, I have been asked to give a short survey about the past and present of translation from the other languages of the Spanish State into Basque and from Basque into said languages for this seminar.
I will try to be as brief with my description as I can when giving my views on the subject. If my topic is to be about the past and present, I am forced to stick just to the past and the present. Indeed, Koldo Izagirre, sitting next to me, is slated to talk about the future of translation which we are covering here.
The past naturally starts from the very beginning. It is a well-known fact that Basque translation truly got off the ground with the translation of the Bible by Johannes Leizarraga. As for defining the limits of the present, namely in a way that the future stems from the present, i.e. in a way that would reflect the sense of how fast time is rushing by, it is more difficult but I would be inclined to set the limit with the lists of the books published in 1986.
Nevertheless, I would not like to limit my description to a brief history of Basque translation and its formal trends: i.e. to make a list of what was translated and how it was done together with commentary.
Starting from what would be mere historical description, I would like to attempt here to come closer to understanding the inner dynamics that have had an impact on history. A mere description often conceals the basic "sense" of events. We should start the section by trying to understand what the processes that shape the situation of each language in the State are and what has led us there.
A historical view of Basque translation
In order to place literary translation from Basque to other languages of the State and vice versa into its true context, we should first define the two parameters which would define the entire body of translation work done from and into Basque. On one hand, out of all the translations done from the languages of the State into Basque and vice versa, the role of literary texts will have to be studied while on the other we would have to delve into the literary translations done into / from Basque into / from the languages mentioned above. In short, we should be aware that this kind of translation that we are spotlighting is only a subset of some other big sets, and that is how it should be regarded if we are to come to grips with its relative importance.
Those who have written about the history of Basque translation have usually divided it up into two main periods in the same way as we could divide up Basque history:
a) The first period when the first Basque-language book found its way to print when Bernart Etxepare published his Linguæ Vasconum Primitiæ in 1545 or, closer to home as far as translation is concerned, when Joannes Leizarraga published Jesus Christen Testament Berria and lasted until the loss of the Special Privileges in 1876, or 1879 when the "literary events" started taking place, in the sense that it is a reflection of a change due to a well-known historical event.
b) The period starting with the celebration of the "literary events" (floral games or "Lore Jokoak") down to our times is usually taken to be the second period. As far as literature is concerned, it is clear that this second period can be set apart from the first one. The literature starting from that date onwards accounts for the problems unlike the ones from previous periods. This change did not come about overnight as convention would have it, but in the last quarter of the 19th century, factors that were to have an impact on the following decades began to appear in Basque society. The same goes for literature and translation, which, to be sure, is no exception to this.
c) Currently, it is reasonable enough for us to assume, in my opinion, both in literature and certainly even more so in the case of translation, that we are living in a time altogether different from previous ones because we have needs unlike other times in which literature and translation are meeting the dynamics of the time. If we could look at it from a literary point of view, we could do so even more from the point of view of a history of translation.
However, these three periods must be described from a sociolinguistic point of view, however short it might be, if the purpose of the translation therein is to be understood. Indeed, it is not very easy, in my opinion, for a history such as ours to be understood in the same vein as the history of their language and the situation during every period in which the linguistic situation is totally different from our own.
A. - First Period
First of all, I should mention several aspects that distinguish the first period of Basque translation and literature from the second.
First and foremost, the time we are talking about were times when the Basque Country was almost totally Basque-speaking, at least at the popular level. The language had quite specific boundaries in which one could say that one language was used in one set of circumstances while another was used in another, though this is not to forget that there were special phenomena regarding such boundaries.
The same could not be said for social boundaries. It seems that the lowest rung of the social order, i.e. peasants, laborers in general, was, for the most part, wholly Basque-speaking until the last part of the 19th century. Father Larramendi, Kardaberaz, and others are witnesses to that. In the preface to J. I. Iztueta's book, Guipuzkoako provinciaren kondaira, published in 1847, the information he uses with humour is quite significant in this sense: within the boundaries of this small province there are around 120,000 souls, 100,000 of whom know only Basque. As for the rest of the twenty thousand, more than half are orphaned from Basque as they do not know where they come from, what blood flows in their veins, and as for the latter 10,000, there must be up to 6,000 people who speak poor Basque and broken Spanish in the consideration that they are great and erudite men.
Iztueta himself says that the upper echelons of Basque society drifted towards Spanish in his time. History also shows this: the Basque bourgeoisie, almost without exception, switched over to Spanish. On the other hand, it supplied Castile with its scribes.
The Catholic Church held sway, it must be admitted, in the use of written Basque and in the production of books. That sense of sway has been more open to discussion. With the Church itself being bilingual at least — we should remember on this point that Larramendi had decried many a time preachers who were unable to preach in clear and suitable language — it probably only used Basque for its pastoral needs. As has often been said, the Basque clergy fulfilled the role of being the intellectual engine of the common, monolingual Basque population until the end of the 19th century.
In that sense it is hardly surprising, beginning with Etxepare until 1879, that 89% of the 195 books dealt with religious topics while only 11% of those published over the three hundred year period, both original and translated works, dealt with non-religious subjects.
Within this context, it is quite hard to find written literary production and even harder to find literary translation, which is exactly what happened. Throughout that three-century period, translations of literature are few and far between:
1. Bizenta Mogel's Ipuin Onac (1804): a translation of Aesop's fables.
2. P. Iturriaga's Fábulas y otras composiciones en verso vascongado (1842), a translation of Samaniego's fables and Virgil's eclogue.
3. P. Iturriaga's Jolasac (1842), in Basque and in Spanish.
4. Archu's Fableak edo Alegiac (1852), a translation of La Fontaine's fables.
5. Goyenetche's Fableak edo Alegiac (1852), a translation of La Fontaine's fables.
6. R. Dasconaguerre's Atheka Gaitzeko oihartzunak (1870), translation by a friend of the author from French.
If only a few of them were translations from the languages of the Spanish State, there is not much to talk about as far as translation during this period is concerned.
This literary translation, moreover, is not only scant, it is not even the finest translation done during this period.
If we take into account religious literary translation and not set translation with a religious theme apart from the rest with the same strictness as we did just above, then we will find that greatest and most remarkable translators to be found during that three hundred year period in the history of Basque translation: Joannes Leizarraga, Silvain Pouvreau, Haraneder, M. Chourio, B. Larreguy, M. Maister, M. Duhalde, M. Inchauspe, P.A. Añibarro, J.C. Echeverria, P. Uriarte.
However, even in literature with a religious theme, translation work done among the languages of the Spanish state is not much worth writing about, during the first centuries of the history of Basque literature, especially until the beginning of the 19th century, writers from the Northern part of the Basque Country took more from French than from Spanish literature as it was predominant in everything.
Finally, to conclude the history of this first period, it would seem that we should look into the importance that translation had and was to have hence forward in Basque literature in order to come to grips with another index, i.e. the proportion between original and translated works: In that way, I. Sarasola has pointed out that from the beginnings of Basque literature, 93 out of 194 works were translation while only 101 were original works, even taking into account adaptations as original work.
That clearly shows, if anything else, the importance of translation in Basque literature.
B. - The Second Period
Tremendous changes started taking place during the last quarter of the 19th century in the Basque Country, especially in the Southern Basque Country both politically and sociolinguistically: the Charter privileges were lost in 1876 and the first "Floral Games" events started to take place. During the last decade of that century, some of the bourgeoisie turned in on themselves which was later to serve as the beginning of a nationalist party as well as the dawning of a socialist party.
Thus, part of the bourgeoisie made a linguistic choice together with a political one, a choice for Basque. Basque came to be an element of the national project for the Basque Country.
However, at the same time, every level of Basque society began to become bilingual over a long, enduring period of time. However, up to then, at least in the lower echelons of society, linguistic boundaries, which were meshed with geographic ones, grew to be more permeable, especially through education.
In conjunction with this process, the language model, which hitherto had been strictly tied to tradition, came to be questioned, especially among writers and translators living in the Southern Basque Country. In face of tradition, there began to appear radical purists of one stripe or another who left their mark until well into the 20th century and who still wield some impact in several peripheral sectors of Basque culture.
The most dyed-in-the-wool radical form of purism that claimed itself to be following in the footsteps of Larramendi and which wished to banish anything that smacked of Spanish — especially Spanish — and which was to become an inexhaustible source for neologisms, was the purism rationalized and spread by Arana-Goiri's followers.
On the other hand, there was a subtler form of radical purism which did not term itself purist, indeed it even claimed to oppose such purism, but it was purist in the area of syntax, starting with R.M. Azkue himself and down to our day in several broad sectors, which speaks out against radical purism on one hand, but still practices it on the other.
These tendencies failed to have much impact on the writers in the Northern Basque Country but as far as translations between the languages of the Iberian Peninsula are concerned, those trends were of tremendous importance.
Radical linguistic purism on a lexical level is a tendency that only happens in translation. The most energetic form of radical purism can be seen in translation and not in original works. However, the communicative function of the text practically disintegrates to nothing. Nevertheless, the most virulent form of purism was to gradually wane.
During this period, efforts aimed at writing began to take place, almost all at once, and this was to be found in translation as well. As for the topics of translations undertaken, these began to multiply and diversify, although not in one fell swoop, both in original works and translations. They came to represent the broad majority, even if religious literature was to play a role for a long time to come. In that way, other kinds of topics began to be published in Basque during that period: history, social topics, medicine, news. Likewise, literary translations began to multiply at the very beginning of this period.
Spanish was the source language for many of those translations as the greatest effort in the diversity and spread of the language was taking place in the Southern Basque where Basque was in direct contact with Spanish, and very much so.
Thus, in 1881, L. Iza Agirre published a part of Calderón's work in Zalameako Alkatia, in an unsuitable translation.
In 1885, Jose Colá's Euskal naparren joaera edo emigrazioa was published and translated by Marcelino Soroa.
In 1887, although there was no literary translation in the strictest sense of the word, a truly remarkable translation of Sardá I Salvany's Liberalen dotriña pecatu da was published minus the name of the translator who was most likely Gregorio Arrue, having translated it in Barcelona.
In 1905, the preface and several of the beginning chapters of Cervantes' Don Quixote were translated and published into Basque by Capt. Duvoisin.
In the years leading up to 1900, several magazines also played a significant role. As for translation, the magazine Euskaltzale, published by the priest Resurrección María Azkue, is worth a special mention. In the last years that it survived by publishing both in Basque and Spanish in its entirety, by "government order" to which we were later to become used to.
Already somewhat through the 20th century, if we are to take a look at the time between the turn of the century and the Spanish Civil War (1900-1936), there were no great changes in subject matter except right before the Spanish Civil War when the first Basque-medium schools were set up and texts were prepared for that purpose.
As book publishing increased, translation also gained more of a role for itself during this time. Literary translation during that time could be divided up into three main types as they met three kinds of needs:
Translation work began on several classical works by setting translation criteria that was to come to fruition during the post-war period. Lazarillo de Tormes (Tormesko itsu-mutila, the Basque title) was one of them, translated by Nikolas Ormaetxea "Orixe" and published in 1929, being one of the most noteworthy and significant works.
On the other hand, work on two kinds of literary translation was begun during that time which was to result in many works: the Spanish translation of Basque folklore: R.M. Azkue's Euskalerriaren Yakintza - Literatura Popular del País Vasco (1935-47) and the Basque translation of Spanish-language literature with Basque theme.
The third important kind of literary translation was the Spanish translation of several works of the best known Basque poems of that period. Collections of poetry by Lizardi, Orixe, Lauaxeta were translated and bilingual Basque and Spanish editions were published. Those translations were most often carried out by the author himself, but alongside the original text they appear lifeless and flimsy.
On the other hand, a large part of literary translation was still published in magazines, or most often in Basque supplements of magazines dealing with Basque culture and folklore which were published in Spanish.
In that way, for example, Balmes' El Criterio (Irizpidea, the Basque title) was translated by J. Zinkunegi and was published in its entirety in the journal Euskal Esnalea in 1919. In these magazines, as a general rule, parts of the books, chapters, stories, and overall short pieces would most often be translated into Basque and published.
The Spanish Civil War put an abrupt end to the lively movement working for the linguistic, literary, and cultural development of the language which had been flourishing just before its outbreak. Many others were forced into exile. The movement which had been gathering strength before the War and was then abruptly squashed, was forced to develop and publish the fruits of their labours in the impotence brought about by exile.
The first Basque books begin to find their way into print well into the 1940's. Orixe was the dean of all translators during that time and the pre-war writers and translators found their voice in the journal Euzko Gogoa. It followed the language policy thought up before the war, especially in two senses: translation of the classics of world literature, and especially fomenting the translation of literature with a Basque theme written in Spanish.
On the other hand, the translation of Basque folklore into Basque went on.
As for translation of world literature, and especially translation of the literature of the languages of the State, B. Amezaga translated J.R. Jiménez's Platero eta biok (Basque title) (1953) after his work on Shakespeare's plays.
Three translators hiding behind the name "Itunbe" translated Hugo Wast's Bide izkutua in 1956.
Jon Etxaide Itharte translated Pio Baroja's Las inquietudes de Shanti Andia under the title Itxasoa laño dago.
In order to get an idea of from what languages translation took place during the same period, the following are some authors: Longfellow, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Svenson, Homer, Plato, Hemingway, R. Tagore.
On the other hand, in sticking to the translation policy that had been going on since before the war, several attempts were made in the translation of Spanish-language literature with a Basque theme. There were another so many Basque-Spanish editions published. We have already mentioned the case of Pio Baroja's Las Inquietudes de Shanti Andia.
In 1955, under the title Elezaharrak -Arraun ta Amets, several short stories taken from Arturo Campion's Narraciones Vascas were translated into Basque and published.
In 1958, A. Campion's work Erraondoko azken danbolinteroa was translated by J. M. Mokoroa and published.
In the very same year, E. Ibero's Eusko Ami was published in Basque and Spanish.
In 1960, J.L. Muñoyerro's Lartaun Eguzki-Semea was published along similar lines.
The same goes for the case of E. García Velloso's Gernikako Arbola, published later on in 1963 and translated by D. Jaka.
As for the translation of Basque folklore and folk literature into Spanish, in addition to continuing with Euskalerriaren Yakintza (1947), there are collections worthy of mention such as J. Riezu's Flor de las canciones populares vascas (1948), J. Gorostiaga's Antología de la poesía popular vasca (1955), and J. M. Barandiaran's El mundo en la mente popular vasca (1962).
C. - The 1960's: the transition period
During the 1960's, a new generation that was to take an active part in the next two decades in following two decades came to the fore.
In that way, at the beginning of the decade, it was not more than a continuation of the previous period but at the end of the decade there were new phenomena that began to crop up in Basque culture.
Political and cultural life in the Basque Country underwent tremendous radicalization.
During about the same time, the widespread phenemonon of ikastolas, Basque-medium schools, was spawned coupled with a political radicalization.
At the end of the 1960's, standardization and the basic steps aimed at coming up with a Unified Basque were taken.
The state of change began to pick up pace.
In that way, the dynamics which we mentioned regarding the previous years hardly changed at all at first, as books and the more or less same kind of translations were being published.
In 1962, B. Gandiaga's poetry book, Elorri, was published in Basque and Spanish. It should be regarded as an except, however, since the translation was given by "order of the government". In 1964, Gabriel Aresti's Harri eta Herri was published in both Basque and Spanish. In 1967, the author himself came out with Euskal harria / La piedra Vasca. L.M. Muxika's Urdin eta Burni / Azul y Hierro (1965) is a book of poetry that was translated from Basque into Spanish and published in a bilingual volume. In 1969, J.M. Arozmena published Ene ixil-oiuak / Voces de mi silencio in the same way.
Basque translations of Spanish literature with Basque themes also continued to be published: the publication of Asarre bidetan / Peregrino de la ira (1966), written by J. Acosta and translated by R. Murua. In the following year, in the same kind of publication, J.L. Muñoyerro's Ilargian ere euskeraz, and R. Zulaica's Ipuin jatorrak were published. In the very same year, 1966, Txomin Agirre's story "Auñamendiko Lorea" was published along with a Spanish translation done by I. Goikoetxea.
Several very important literary translations began to be published:
1967: C.J. Cela's Pascual Duarte (Basque title: Paskual Duarte) translated by Jautarkol.
1968: T. Meabe's Hamalau alegia, translated by G. Aresti.
The source language of the translations began to diversify among the languages of the Spanish State:
In 1966, S. Espriu's El llibre de Sinera was published and translated into Basque by Juan San Martin. In the following year, Païs Basc and La Pell de brau by the same author and translated by the same translator appeared in print.
During those same years, further translations from Catalan continued, Pedrolo (Homes e no) and Ricard Salvat's works were translated and performed.
In 1967, J.A. Etxebarria published the poetry collection entitled Kataluña'ko Olerkariak.
The first work translated from Galician was done by Gabriel Aresti in 1969: Marcos de Portela's Catecismo do labrego published under the title Nekazariaren dotriña. The next translation was published in 1976: A. Rodriquez Castelao's Kristalezko begia was translated by Koldo Izagirre.
Henceforth, if we were to make mention of translated works one by one, we would only make the list longer.
What is truly important at this moment is the revolutionary change taking place as far as Basque is concerned. Indeed, a large part of the population came clearly out in favour of the language so people could live in Basque, and irreversible steps towards that goal began to be taken.
Translation, thenceforth, was to take on more and more the role of striving towards reaching the goal of a country where the linguistic situation has been normalized.
D. - The Latest Period
From the middle of the 1970's until the present, conditions which have never existed in the history of the Basque language have arisen almost at once. As a result of the cultural and political movement set up in the 1960's, and having attained self-government, we Basque translators are challenged to participate in efforts to meet the sociopolitical and cultural needs of the Basque Country.
The Basque Country is striving as never before to make the local population and social life Basque-speaking. This is being achieved in many areas: language teaching for youths and adults, the presence of Basque in the mass media, making the government administration Basque-speaking, and in efforts to normalize the language.
The first bit of information that we Basque translators must bear in mind if we are to understand the present situation in which we are living is that the Basque Country is firstly a "self-translating" society. The greatest translation efforts are aimed at translating into Basque the production of text which arises from everyday living, the government, teaching profession, and the mass media.
We have not reached this situation, however, overnight. During the first half of the 1970's, when there was no self-government, bringing forward the project of Basque-medium education was the greatest cultural challenge. The greatest translation efforts were directed towards that, i.e. the production of school texts and reading material.
During the first year at the beginning of the 1970's, the group "Rosa Sensat" and a few other publishing houses from Catalonia had a great impact on the first translations that were carried out for the ikastolas. Since then, there have been many translations from Catalan in the field of children's literature.
In the ten-year period encompassing 1976-1986, 60 children's literature books or booklets were translated from Catalan into Basque. An explanation for this could be due to the prestige or the dissemination policy carried out by Catalan publishing houses.
On the other hand, it is often questionable regarding the source language in many cases. Indeed, although in some cases there can be no doubt that they were translated from Catalan, in other cases it is not all too certain and there are indications that the Basque version just might have been translated from the Spanish version. A great many of these books mentioned above were published by the Catalan publishing houses themselves who often published them in Spanish and then in Basque.
Over the last ten years, literary translation from Catalan to Basque has been almost entirely restricted to the realm of children's literature.
An exception to that is M. Gonzalez's translation of Mercé Rodoreda's five stories, published under the title Ipuin Hautatuak in 1984.
As for translations done from Spanish, the distribution is more balanced. It is true that the priority given to children's literature applies here as well. Over the last decade, 98 out of 134 translations translated from Spanish to Basque were for children's literature. However, another 33 works were pure literary translations.
Several works of importance were among them, including Cervantes' Don Quixote (Kixote, 1976), translated by Pedro Berrondo, G. García Márquez's Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Heriotza iragarritako baten kronika, 1982), translated by Xalbador Garmendia and J. Rulfo's Lautada Sutan (1982), translated by J. Etxabe.
Here too there is a suspicion that was similarly expressed about Catalan translations. That is to say, Spanish was the intermediary language of some translations supposedly translated from other languages, especially those in children's literature.
As for Galician, many years went by without anything being translated at all until 1984 when A. M. Labaien translated P. Castelao's Os vellos non deben de namorarse and 1986 when four works by the same author were translated and published: Gauzak, Betiko Biak, Beti Galizan, and Zirtzilak.
Note: This article was published in Senez, 8, 1989.
