SOME REACTIONS TO POINTS MADE IN “AN EVALUATION OF THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF AN INDONESIAN NOVEL” BY SUGENG HARIYANTO (1997)
by THOMAS M. HUNTER
I. Principles of Translation
It may be interesting to know that I had not specifically studied translation theory before 1989, when I began translating Burung-Burung Manyar. However, I had attained a Ph.D. in Linguistics at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and was strongly influenced by the works of my “Promoter” Dr. A. L. Becker. (I am enclosing a photocopy of one of his essays from Beyond Translation (1996) as an example.) Becker believes, following Walter Benjamin, that the form and content of language cannot be separated. The form, or style, of a writer is not a “package” that is used to “contain” his, or her, “meaning” or “content.” Thus, for example, an old Javanese poem in translation must attempt to recreate in English something of the form of the old Javanese poem. As Becker has said, this is a utopian – even impossible task, but one that we must attempt.
Another important principle I learned from Becker is the notion of “prior text” and its extension “cultural prior text.” As a linguistic example note (1) following
(1) Ken Angrok memegang keris itu.
Here itu refers to a linguistic “prior text”, something that the writer (or speaker) assumes is shared common knowledge with the reader (or listener). A simple example of a cultural prior text would be the use of “Mas” by an Indonesian (especially Javanese) wife to her husband. Imagine what this term conveys if we really think about it, especially in contrast to western kinship patterns. As a rough approximation:
(1) the older sibling – younger sibling relationship is a very important one in Indonesian families.
(2) the older sibling should, in a sense, care for and cherish the younger sibling.
(3) the younger sibling therefore should feel “safe” and “protected” by the older sibling, at the same time respecting the older sibling.
(4) in marriage the male is often perceived as “replacing” or “representing” the older sibling, while the wife may “picture herself” as the younger sibling who should be protected by the older sibling, and show him respect. (Javanese terms for wife like “Ingkang Rayi”, of course, strengthen this identification of the wife as younger sibling.)
For me a translation of a work like Burung-burung Manyar should include a generous glossary that can help convey “cultural prior texts.” Naturally explanations do not need to be as long as the above, which could perhaps be shortened as follows:
“Mas”, Javanese term for “older brother”, also used as a term of endearment by a wife, or public term of address used with men providing a service like peddicab driving, shifting to “Pak” when more age/respect is indicated.
Another “prior text” that I felt was important in Burung-burung Manyar was the “historical prior text.” Romo Mangun refers to many important historical events, sometimes simply by citing a single name or word (“Westerling” and Muhamad Roem” are examples). I used Yamin’s Nationalism and Revolutions in Indonesia and several Indonesian language books to study the history of the Indonesian revolution as I was working on translating BBM. I hoped that the Glossary for the Lontar Foundation Publication could be used as a “mini history” of the Indonesian revolution. Unfortunately the editors of Lontar did not feel they could market a book with such a lengthy Glossary.
Since 1994 I have been studying post-structural literary theory, but have not greatly changed my principles of translation. What I try to do is to find an appropriate “idiomatic match” for the Indonesian original in the English with which I am familiar.
Lontar has offered me the opportunity to redo my translation of BBM, and as soon as I have time to do so I would like to make a second attempt. Quite a few critics have objected to some of my longer paraphrases, with good reason, while I would like to return some “local flavor” (Lontar’s editors, for example, replaces my melinjo with gnetum nut simply because the latter is found in the Oxford English Dictionary.
After reading my objections to the editing of my BBM translation as published one friend directed me to Anthony Burgess’ Malay Trilogy (or The Long Day Waves). I feel Burgess has masterfully retained a great deal of local color, without sacrificing “flow” of the narrative. In a rewriting of my BBM translation I would like to attempt something closer to Burgess’ style for retaining local color. After all, part of the reason we read novels is to experience “other worlds and other places.”
II. Specific Points
Here, I will comment on specific points with which I agreed or disagreed from
Hariyanto (1997).
1. Page 9. In principle I disagree with Nida and Taber (1982) and Gutt (1991) that we can isolate the meaning of a text.
2. Page 10. Since I don’t agree that translating is a matter of transferring meaning from one language to the next I do not see “errors” in translation as arising from “restructuring”. Nida and Taber are clearly in the “Platonic idealist” school of thought in their understanding of language. This school of thought is of course important, but has recently been strongly challenged by a variety of critics.
3. Page 23 (bottom): You are correct; I should have said “poked in the stomach” (In fact Lontar have changed this; please see my typed draft for BBM translation enclosed).
4. Page 24: I used “great-grandmother” intentionally. Perhaps “gantung siwur” would have been preferable but we do have to be careful not to have an overabundance of untranslated words. Beyond that – please excuse me for saying so – “great-great-great-great grandmother” in English.
5. Page 24, ex. 6: I strongly disagree. “Piglet” does have negative connotations in English, while “young bitch” would be totally unacceptable as it implies “wanita/perempuan muda yang sama sekali tidak punya harga diri dan malah kasar sekali!”
(Black English speakers use “little bitch” as a joking term of friendship, but only among close friends.)
6. Page 26, ex. (7). Please check my BBM translation draft. I thought I originally said, “So, The Royal Dutch Army.”
7. Page 26, ex. (8): You may be correct, but I would defend my use of “what did you expect” as I was trying to capture a stronger nuance of mana that I feel is not captured by simply using “of course.”
8. Page 27 “sayer” additions: I disagree that these are “unnecessary additions”. My principle here was when completing the final draft, I found that I could not follow the shifts of speaker or discourse topic in English. I added “sayer” phrase to clarify the reference. I admit that this is “bold” translation but I believe in some cases it can be justified.
9. Page 27, ex. 1-4: I actually feel a bit uncomfortable with my longish paraphrases and additions here. Romo Mangun objected to them after reading my draft for chapters one and two, saying they made the narrator (Teto) sound like a “schoolteacher.” However, at this time I don’t have a better solution. I don’t think we can retain all Javanese words as this will tire the reader.
10. Page 28, exs. (1)-(4): The additions here are not exactly for the sake of “smoothness of sentence flow.” As I have said above I tried to establish a “voice” for Teto based on an exaggerated version of my own idiomatic English used in informal situations. Words or phrases like “one of my escapades”, “You might say” and “not very disciplined” are part of this “voice”.
11. Page 28, “cultivator most high”: This is a case where I was trying to capture a larger point that Romo Mangun was trying to make about the term Petanen – I transposed part of that larger meaning as an addition to raja. I’m not sure that this attempt was successful.
12. Page 24, ex. (1): “Native princes” for raja Inlander. You have missed something here. I am actually playing with the British colonialist phrase “native princes” that was used to refer to Kings in the colonial territories. A careful reader might catch this “sindiran”, especially if they were aware of post colonial critical trends in current work of cultural critique of western colonial discourses. I suspect Romo Mangun might approve here.
13. Page 34, b, point 3. I clearly do not agree: I tried very hard to perform the task of translating keywords correctly. To be perfectly frank I have yet to see work by other translators that improves on my -admittedly crude- attempts.
14. Page 37, no. 3-4. You have failed to understand that “the genuine article” is a very common English idiom that means something like “genuine” or “asli”. Therefore, it is an appropriate translation of totok. Neither “pure” nor “things” are necessarily better translations. My use of the idiom was part of the question of “voice”. To me “pure Dutch” doesn’t convey any meaning at all. Few westerners ever speak of “pure Dutch” or “pure English” as opposed (to) “not pure Dutch.”
15. Page 38, ex. 1: I was happy to see that you accepted my “junior queen” for selir. I worked very hard on that. Thank you.
16. Page 39, SL ex (2): You may be correct, but I felt it was necessary to add “the truth of my origin” as the whole point is that Teto’s friends want to remind him of who he really is. But perhaps I added too much.
17. Page 39, ex (5): I am quite surprised to hear you say “English speakers would say “mother’s complexion” instead. Am I not English speaker?!? My principles here were:
(1) Were are taught in English composition classes to avoid too many repetitions of the same word in a single sentence or short paragraph, but rather to use synonyms. When referring to “complexion” “skin” is a perfectly acceptable synonym;
(2) “Skin” has a greater “shade value” as it suggests worries about descent, nationality and/or ethnic group. Since Teto is concerned about these things here I wanted to draw attention to this fact with the stronger word.
18. Page 40, ex. (1) on sepandri: I think you are correct here, but is there perhaps a way to keep the implication without simply retaining sepandri , plus Glossary note. I agree with Lontar editorial policy that too many cases of having to refer to the glossary may be tiring. They believe the glossary should supply additional information, but that readers will not read a book if they can only do so with help of a glossary. Again, footnotes are “out” (tidak boleh) for English language novels, at least at this stage in literary history.
19. Page 40, ex. (4): Yes, I agree. “Falling down” was more important here than “getting caught” and just “carefully” may have been enough.
III. Conclusions
The kinds of work you are doing in Hariyanto (1997) is very valuable, In addition to beginning to provide guidelines for future translators it has helped me to reassess my translation work. However, I think work like this should be checked with the translator before going to make general formulations (thank you, in fact, for doing so!). It may well be that a translator has had a principle in mind in choosing a particular phrase that may not be obvious to the analyst. (My choice of “native princes” for raja Inlander is one example.)
IV. Some Further Background Materials
I have said that part of the inspiration for my translation was the many things I learned about the Indonesian revolution while I stayed in the home of the late Ibu Soeprapto in June -Aug. 1980, my first visit to Indonesia. Mrs. Soeprapto had a wonderful sense of humor and had experienced the revolution first hand. Her husband was a post master for the Dutch administration. They were forced to flee the outer Kraton area of Solo in 1946 and transfer to Salatiga. Ibu told me that she often provided food to the pejuang from her kitchen while serving tea to Dutch postal officials in the front room. Sometimes former pejuang came to her kitchen to chat while I was staying there. When I asked, “Why do they still seem to be poor?” She would say, laughing, “Karena Petruk sing dados ratu.” Later she explained that many poor, honest pejuang stayed poor, while others got rich. So I was introduced to the theme of “Setan Kopor” that I later encountered in BBM.
Ibu Soeprapto was also well-versed in Javanese culture and often spoke to me of its good -and sometimes bad- aspects. She believed in rukun Keluarga, and the importance of nilai-nilai alus but said people now also had to learn to be more “berdikari”. During these three months I traveled extensively in Jateng, that’s when not busy studying Indonesian at the Cotia Program. I visited Ambarukmo, Bandungan, Magelang, Muntilan and Jogyakarta several times so became quite familiar with Teto’s “home territory.” My friends and I visited villages on the northern slopes of Merbabu and in the Dieng area several times, often “getting lost on purpose” so we could see local villages without causing suspicion! We even wandered into a Kethoprak performance once – what fun!!
So the geographical area of BBM was not new to me when I read it, while I had “inside information” on the revolution and Javanese culture from the late Mrs. Soeprapto. In addition, I had a troubled youth, and during 1988-91 experienced the failure of my marriage. Because of that the character of Teto, and the metaphor of Placeus Manyar, had a special meaning to me, on a very personal basis. My experience in translating BBM helped me through a very difficult period, providing a teladan, a humanistic, philosophical approach to life that gave me a healthier perspective than I might have had otherwise.
I visited Romo Mangun for the first time in mid 1990. We discussed my work on chapters One and Two of BBM and he gave me some valuable pointers. I am enclosing my notes on that visit called “Looking for Romo Mangun.” I also read “Pengakuan Seorang Amatir” very carefully in preparing to complete my translation. I later completed a translation of that work (1993); I am also enclosing a copy of that translation as yet unpublished.
There was some controversy surrounding the publication of my translation. Leila Chudori’s review in Tempo mentioned several “titik keberatan” Romo Mangun. I countered with a letter to the editor in the following issue of Tempo saying that the published work was not “Edisi Hunter” but rather “Edisi Lontar”.
What happened was this: I sent in my final draft in October 1990. Lontar editors revised my work. In early 1991 they told me they wanted to release the book in late February due to “funding concerns” so hoped I would not mind not having a chance to review their editorial work. I reluctantly agreed, but was later regretful (menyesal). In a long letter of April 1991 I explained to Romo Mangun that everyone of the “titik keberatan” that Leila mentioned were in fact the work of Lontar editors and were not to be found in my final draft. Syukur, the editorial board of Lontar had previously written a contract granting me the right to make further changes to the translation if and when a second or third printing was contemplated. Unfortunately, while Lontar now plans a second printing I have not yet found time to make needed revisions. When I do so your work, Pak Sugeng, while no doubt be very useful. Thanks again!
