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maltatoday | SUNDAY • 10 JULY 2022 8 INTERVIEW 'Dividing everything into two is Apart from writing novels, you have also translated numerous foreign-language works into Maltese. There has been a lot of discussion, recently, about the role of gender in transla- tion: for instance, when Emily Wilson became the first woman to translate 'The Odyssey' into English, she discovered that previous translations (by men) had subtly introduced 'patriar- chal' biases, that were not nec- essarily implied in the original text. In your own experience, do you feel that gender really makes such a difference, when it comes to translating? In an ideal world, gender would not be an issue when it comes to literary translation. Once gender becomes practi- cally irrelevant to one's desti- ny and role in life – as are, for example, the colour or shape of one's eyes – it would no longer matter whether a literary work is written by a male, female, or a gender non-conforming writ- er; nor would it make any dif- ference who ends up translating them. In reality, however, the impli- cations of 'who translates who' are still things we have to think very seriously about. There is, as you mention, already an is- sue with men translating other men, and adding misogynis- tic elements where there were none to begin with. Moreover, men translating women today tends to feel like a betrayal of sorts, while women translating men has been seen as problem- atic by many throughout the centuries. Things have changed, of course - women are no longer expected to translate only re- ligious texts, as any other text was deemed inappropriate for women. But gender has al- ways been a battleground, so it comes as no surprise to dis- cover that male translators have sometimes wilfully, or perhaps naively, worded certain phras- es in classical texts in ways that continue asserting the role of men over women. It's like men have always felt entitled to re- mind women of their weaker position. They were always al- lowed to do so; and they always got away with it. Translation is a powerful tool and so must be used very care- fully. We are now more con- scious than ever about how careful translators have to be in conveying an honest rendering of a text into another language. So for me, a good translator, like a good writer, is not defined by their gender but by their honest attention to detail, characteri- sation, ideas. Now: whether that honesty is itself undermined by an ideological framework, is the more burning question. Is it a question that has ever troubled you as a translator, though? When translating works written by men, for in- stance: are you concerned that your own ideological view- points may end up influencing the finished result? While working on Bertolt Bre- cht's 'Mother Courage And Her Children', I was aware of the fact that Brecht had spent years editing draft after draft of this play: each time adding to the complexity of the character of the Mother, so as to make sure that she does not sound like the stereotype of the 'suffering mother'; and that we, the audi- ence, don't end up feeling too emotional about her losses dur- ing the Thirty Year War. Brecht was very keen on keep- ing this distance between the characters and the spectator. This obviously guided me in my choice of words while translat- ing the text. I was aware of the affinity and empathy I some- times felt towards this strong woman, who is doing everything in her power to survive the war and keep both her business and her family alive. But I also kept in mind Brecht's theories for his epic theatre, so I made sure I was not "feminising" it as I went along. As for my own work in transla- tion, I can truly say that working with Kat Storace, who translat- ed my collection of short stories 'Mill-bieb 'il ġewwa' (Ede Books, 2019) into English as 'What will it take for me to leave?' (Praspar Press, 2022), has been an amaz- ing experience. It felt more like a collaboration. I could say that it worked be- cause she is a woman translator, and that women translate wom- en writers better. But I'd rather not say that, as what I would like to believe is that an honest translator is the best translator; and our political commitment to this honesty is more impor- tant than the gender per se of writer and translator. Turning to your latest novel, Marta Marta. You described the work as 'polyphonic': which, in- terestingly enough, is the same word Wilson used to describe her Odyssey translation. This is the clean opposite of how the Patriarchy usually man- ifests itself (which is always either 'monolithic' – the One True God; the One True Church, etc. – or 'binary'). Would I be right in guessing, then, that it's not just the plot, the story, the characterisation, etc., that challenges the Patriarchy… but also the narrative structure of the novel itself? With her latest book Marta Marta, novelist and translator LORANNE VELLA argues that a plurality of voices – as opposed to the stark binarity of the male/female divide – is 'the best weapon against the patriarchy' Raphael Vassallo rvassallo@mediatoday.com.mt