An eighteenth-century German edition of Algernon Sidney’s Discourses Concerning Government (1683)
If you are an early modernist interested in translation, print and the book trade in Europe and you can make it to Wolfenbüttel this summer, drop in on our workshop on 26 and 27 June. We are gathering at the excellent Duke August Library (HAB) once in the charge of the Enlightenment philosopher Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-81) to discuss all things related to ‘Translating Cultures: Translations, Transmission and Dissemination of Printed Texts in Europe 1640-1795’.
Key works of early modern social and political thought, such as Samuel von Pufendorf’s De jure naturae et gentium (1672), John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government (1689), or Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Émile (1762) were read, used and passed around by scholars and interested lay people across Europe, contributing to the spread of ideas and knowledge across countries and borders.
Yet, little is known about the translation processes and translators that enabled these texts to travel and reach their readers in their own vernacular languages. This two-day workshop therefore addresses the key role of translation in the dissemination and reception of ideas in print across Europe during the period from the mid-seventeenth century to the French Revolution.
A German edition of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Émile (1762).
In this period, Latin lost its position as the preferred international language amongst scholars, the Republic of Letters, and educated readers. At the same time, the growth of printing in the major vernacular languages of Europe facilitated the dissemination of shared ideas and cultural identities across a more socially diverse range of readers using their native languages. The workshop will address the various processes involved in the translation, transmission and distribution of texts, while also looking at their wider cultural understanding, which involved the many ways in which the texts were acquired, read, used, passed around and received.
In order to provide a better understanding of translators as cultural agents, a particular focus will be on the selective reception and adaptation of texts to suit their new readers, employing the concept of ‘cultural translation’, as distinct from ‘straight’ or literal translation (Peter Burke, 2009).
The workshop will necessarily centre on those parts of Europe with the most lively book trades, including the British Isles, the Netherlands, France, Germany and northern Italy, but the approach will be widely comparative. Broader conceptual papers will give an insight in both theories of translations and general translation practices, and how such cultural communication may have helped to create new ideas and identities.
The eighteenth-century building of the Bibliotheca Augusta.
Some of the works discussed are available at the library itself, and you might get a chance to look at some of them while you are there. The event is convened by Prof Thomas Munck and myself with administrative support from the excellent HAB staff and funding by the DFG, and we have invited a range of excellent scholars from all over Europe in an attempt to defy Brexit and strengthen scholarly networks across borders.
Click here for the programme.
If you are interested in coming along, please contact forschung@hab.de.
