Going International through Translation

The wake of globalization has created a shared knowledge platform where words travel across the world through translation. Nowadays, the essence of translation is gaining new height, as the author and translator are being given equal credits in international awards for their respective works. The 2019 Man Booker International Prize , for instance, was given to both author Jokha al-Harthi and translator Marilyn Booth for their book Celestial Bodies, which was translated from Arabic to English. In the context of literature, translation is not just a mere way of converting words; instead, it involves the natural adaptation of text in a different context and deliver meaning without hampering the organic sense of existing source text.

Translation has given wings to many local texts for centuries; from the translation of Sumerian poem ‘Gilgamesh’ in the Asian language during the second millennium BC to modern days, the scope of literary translation has sustained its importance in every language around the world. If we trace the beginning of translation in Nepal, history book has recorded the fact that in early eighteenth-century Aadikavi Bhanubhakta Acharya earned literary fame by translating Hindu epic Ramayana from Sanskrit into Nepali for making it available to wider readers. Following the history, today, the scope of literary translation is finding new grounds along with the evolution in the translation approach, which has shifted from mechanical reproduction to creative representation or from rewriting to recreating the text. Nowadays, translation is not a passive adaptation of existing text; rather, it’s a kind of new creation that requires creative use of words, and a translator gives new life to the text. One of the renowned translators and Translation Studies researcher of Nepal Bal Ram Adhikari in his paper entitled “Literary translation as regeneration of text” has stated that translation is a process whereby a new text is formed or created; the process whereby the old text is revitalized in another language.

When local literature crosses linguistic borders, they not only take our words to the wider audience, but the text also reinforces strong ground for cultural assimilation and ensures international recognition of Nepali creativity. Being a student of English literature, I have always cultivated the strong impulse to translate Nepali knowledge illuminated by Laxmi Prasad Devkota, Lekh Nath Poudyal, and other celebrated writers whose works have not got enough international recognition they deserve. The theme of cosmic awareness in Devkota’s poem, moral awakening in Poudyal’s work, Stream of Consciousness in Shankar Lamichhane’s writing, and experimentation in Bhupi Serchan’s poems will never enter the canon unless we translate them for wider international readers. This initiative will bridge the gap between world literature and Nepali literature by knitting them together in a common platform. Similarly, the international adaptation of Nepali literature will ensure our contribution to global literature by expanding the scope of vocabulary and adding more utterable in the lexicon. The demand of certain words during translation for acute expressibility will automatically contribute to the coinage of new words accordingly with the essence of local dialect. For example, we have separate words in the Nepali language to describe various kinds of laughter. When those laughing experiences are set to translate into English, the effort certainly requires the coinage of new English words.

More importantly, the translation of Nepali literature helps us to fight back educational colonialism prevailing in our academia. Nepal, the land of Vedic knowledge and Buddhist philosophy, can prove the world that our history of knowledge and understanding is in no way inferior to their bulky writings. But unfortunately, we have never been able to maintain the literary reciprocity as we have always consumed English literature in the English language and even in Nepali translated forms, but have never offered enough outlets to our literature in English translation. Of course, we need to enrich our literary vault by translating the works of literary demigods like Shakespeare, Hemingway, Milton, Tagore, and other celebrated cross-border writers. We equally need to offer the writing of our local literary demigods to international readers via translation. Once I encountered a Canadian friend who was well informed about our decade-long Maoist insurgency. Upon inquiry, I came to know that he got all information from Narayan Wagle’s Palpasa Café, which was translated into English by Bikash Sangruala. That’s where the significance of translation lies — our suffering and traumatic history of civil war have spanned across countries and reached thousands of readers owing to translation. Such comments from foreign friends sometime compel me to think that many people out there are eager to see Nepal via our literature, and we have not been able to quench their curiosity.

Due to lack of exposer to translation, we are not able to showcase our rich literary faculty, which is no less than celebrated western texts. Till date, our literary texts are produced and consumed mainly inside home, with less outreach to global readers. Writer and translation researcher Manjushree Thapa, who translated Indra Bahadur Rai’s novel Aja Ramita Chha into English as There’s a Carnival Today , agrees that translation has given Nepali literature greater visibility. Continuing similar initiative, Nepal should emphasize translating more Nepali literature in the sellable languages to ensure our position in the mainstream literary canon. If we show reluctance to act now, many of the best literary creations in the Nepali language will never reach global readers simply because of the translation gap. So let us give global reach to Nepali literature, let us translate local words for global readers. When local literature finds a way to the global forum, it will automatically give international recognition to our literary works. And maybe someday we can expect students in some random European University will be studying the comparison of James Joyce’s stream of consciousness with Shankar Lamichhane’s writing style.