1. Anthea Bell
Do you know Anthea Bell? For more than 40 years she has translated the adventures of Asterix and Obelix from French to English. Her creativity made it possible to keep the French wittiness intact, as people thought it would be too French and impossible to translate. She found “Asterix and the Banquet” the most difficult to translate because of all the British accents with which the ancient Britons speak French. She did find a solution and used a dated style of vocabulary such as you might find in the novels of PG Wodehouse: a lot of the characters went “I say old chap, jolly good, what ho! Old fruit...”. Apparently, Goscinny – who spoke excellent English – approved every translation and even laughed at “old fruit” saying he wished he’d thought of that - “vieux fruit.”
2. George Eliot
De tweede vertaalster in onze reeks #womenintranslation, George Eliot, beschouwd als een van de grootste Victoriaanse schrijvers, koos een mannelijke pensnaam om ervoor te zorgen dat haar werk serieus werd genomen. Ze begon met de vertaling van 'Het Leven van Jezus' van Friedrich Strauss en ‘Het Wezen van het Christendom' van Ludwig Feuerbach. Het toppunt voor een agnost! Vervolgens ging ze voorgoed schrijven, en het voorwoord van Sayings (een compilatie van haar mooiste citaten, gepubliceerd in 1871) zegt veel over haar werk: “Wat Shakespeare voor het theater deed, deed George Eliot voor de roman.”
3. Anne Buydens
The third translator in our series #womenintranslation is Anne Buydens. She was born in 1919 in Hanover. Her parents fleed Germany and settled in Belgium where Anne acquired the Belgian citizenship. She perfected her French while studying in Paris and thanks to her two other languages- German and English – she started working as a translator just as the Second World War broke out. She subtitled French movies in German. That’s how she discovered the film industry. While visiting a film set in 1953, she met the one who would become her husband… Kirk Douglas.
4. Emilie du Châtelet
A brilliant mind remembered for her love affair. Emilie du Châtelet lived in the 18th century. We can thank this splendid philosopher and scientist for the French translation of Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy.
Her parents provided her with a very liberal education for that time. She also perfected her scientific studies with the help of Maupertuis and by her much-remarked attendance at Parisian salons where scholars gathered.
Unfortunately she is mainly remembered for her relationship with Voltaire. As André Maurois put it: “Madame du Châtelet is a remarkable example of how women become immortal thanks to their illegitimate love affairs, as long as the object is illustrious.”
5. Isabelle de Montolieu
Isabelle de Montolieu was born in 1751 in Lausanne. Her parents were close to Voltaire and she met Jean-Jacques Rousseau, to whom she devoted an unwavering admiration. In 1786, she published her first novel, 'Caroline de Lichtfield', which was a huge success and even influenced Jane Austen in the development of her female characters, including Marianne Dashwood in 'Sense and Sensibility'. And it is Isabelle de Montolieu who will be in charge of the translation into French of the first novel of the English novelist. But it is especially her translation of the successful German novel 'The Swiss Family Robinson' that will remain in the annals. She reworked several parts of it, reducing the moralizing parts, adding chapters and changing the ending! This French version will be a great success in bookshops and will even serve as a basis for the English translation, that is the most widely read even today.
6. Françoise Pfaff
Françoise Pfaff, of Alsatian and Guadeloupean origin, was born and educated in Paris. She is the author of several books on African cinema, including "Les femmes africaines dans les films de Sembène" and "A l’écoute du cinéma sénégalais". Her particularity as a translator is that she has translated into English her own books written in French, including her most famous, "Conversations with Maryse Condé" and its sequel, "Nouveaux entretiens avec Maryse Condé", dedicated to the famous writer of Guadeloupean origin. She is currently a professor at Howard University (Washington, DC.) where she teaches French, Caribbean and African literature and African cinema.
7. Anne Dacier
« Ses traductions de Térence et d’Homère lui font un honneur immortel ». Son père brave les préjugés misogynes de l’époque et lui donne la même éducation qu’à ses fils. Elle apprend, entre autres, le grec, «la plus belle de toutes les langues». Elle publie en 1674 son ouvrage le Florus. Le public découvre avec stupéfaction que son auteur est une femme. Son premier ouvrage, Florus, connaît un succès d’autant plusgrand que le public découvre avec stupéfaction que son auteur est une femme. En 1681, elle traduit pour la première fois «Les Poésies d’Anacréon et de Sapho». Elle ne publiera que des traductions par la suite. Indignée par une mauvaise traduction, Anne Dacier dédiera quinze années à une meilleure version française de l’Iliade et de l’Odyssée.Elles seront saluées comme des chefs-d’œuvre. C’est pour elle que le mot« traductrice » fut introduit dans la langue française.
