Between identity and otherness: the poetic word of Philippe Jaccottet and the paradox of the transparent translator

Authors

  • Simona Pollicino Università di Roma Tre

Abstract

In the poetics of Philippe Jaccottet the concept of ‘transparency’ is both an ethical and an aesthetic value. Inspired by this principle, the poet renounces any ambition to know reality and to represent it, since he distrusts the mediating function of language and images as an obstacle to the transparency of the poem. The poet constantly revises his text by means of precise procedures, in order to let the poetic word express the essence of its sound and the truth of nature. Inseparable from poetic creation, translation is for Jaccottet a precious opportunity to re-evaluate his own writing in the sign of transformation and renewal. The aim of this article is to investigate how the work of Jaccottet in its different forms reveals the traces of other poetic traditions. Both in writing and in translation the poet always remains a discreet presence, not absent but rather 'transparent', whose self-obliterating experience will allow another poetic voice to sound clear.

Author Biography

Simona Pollicino, Università di Roma Tre

Simona Pollicino è professore associato di lingua e traduzione francese all’Università Roma Tre. I suoi ambiti di ricerca riguardano l’immaginario spaziale nella letteratura francese (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: una poetica dello spazio, L’Harmattan Italia, 2005), la traduzione letteraria, con particolare riguardo alla poesia e alla questione del ritmo, e le interconnessioni tra la poesia e le altre arti. Ha dedicato diversi contributi ai poeti e traduttori Yves Bonnefoy e Philippe Jaccottet tra cui la monografia Enjeux rythmiques de la traduction poétique. Yves Bonnefoy et Philippe Jaccottet à l’écoute des autres (Aracne, 2018) e i saggi, tra gli altri, “Traduire le rythme de la danse ou l’expérience de l’unité: Y. Bonnefoy traduit To a child dancing in the wind de W. B. Yeats” (2014),“La fonction rythmique de la répétition lexicale: Bonnefoy traducteur de Pascoli” (2017). È inoltre curatrice (con G. Henrot Sostero) del volume collettaneo Traduire en poète (Artois Presses Université, 2017). Sulla poesia e le arti ha pubblicato alcuni saggi tra i quali “Dedham vu de Langham o la musica del visibile” (2008) e “Bonnefoy après Baudelaire, Mallarmé et Valéry. Une "conversation" à quatre sur poésie et photographie” (2019).

Published

15-06-2020

How to Cite

Pollicino, S. (2020). Between identity and otherness: the poetic word of Philippe Jaccottet and the paradox of the transparent translator. Elephant & Castle, (22). Retrieved from https://elephantandcastle.unibg.it/index.php/eac/article/view/297

Issue

Section

Articoli