When President Joe Biden was inaugurated on Jan. 20, 22-year-old African-American poet Amanda Gorman made a name for herself by reciting her poem “The Hill We Climb.
Immediately after the inauguration, her book of poems hit No. 1 on Amazon’s best-seller list and was translated into several languages. Recently, however, there was a translation fiasco in Spain and the Netherlands, as the translator was not of African descent and not a woman, and the original translation was withdrawn.
The Spanish Writer Victor Obiols received an invitation from a publisher three weeks ago to translate Gorman’s work into Catalan. Only after completing the translation was he informed by the publisher that he had been advised that he was not suitable to translate Gorman’s work and that his translation would not be used. Obiols complained to AFP that the complainant wanted a young woman, preferably of African descent and a social activist, to translate Gorman’s poems, which left him quite dumbfounded.
Obiols is experienced in translating literary works and has translated great works by Shakespeare, Wilde and other great writers. Obiols said the publisher had promised to still pay him, but described the incident as complex and should not be considered trivial.
In fact, Obiols is not an isolated case. Earlier, the 29-year-old Dutch writer Rijneveld (Marieke Lucas Rijneveld) resigned from his job as a translator of Gorman’s poetry because of the criticism he attracted for his white identity. Rijneveld became the youngest winner of the Booker International Prize in 2020 with his book The Discomfort of Evening, and was originally invited by the publisher to translate We Walked the Hills and Gorman’s first book of poems into Dutch, praising him as a dream candidate, and Gorman himself retweeted his statement on Twitter.
The Spanish writer Obiols has translated the works of Shakespeare and other great writers. (Reprinted from Victor Obiols Llandrich Bocanegra Facebook page)
Dutch writer Llandrich Bocanegra won the Booker International Prize in 2020, becoming the youngest ever winner. (From bureauguusje website)
Despite this, there are still Dutch people who question Llanaver’s background because she is not an African-American woman. Janice Deul, a journalist for the Dutch newspaper The People, called the decision “baffling,” stressing that she was not questioning Lanaver’s ability to translate, but why not pick a black woman like Gorman to translate?
Although the publisher had no intention of voluntarily changing the translator, Lennarfer was shocked by the controversy and decided to decline the offer. The Dutch conservative newspaper The Telegraph criticized Lannover’s actions as “kowtowing to the Awakening.
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