Cosmopolitanism and Translation

The commingling of cultures that is part of cosmopolitanism paves the way for a transnational translation or a translation process that is not confined to particular national boundaries. As Cronin explains: “Contrary to earlier practice in the field of translation studies, it is no longer possible to limit histories of translation to literary phenomena within the territorial boundaries of the nation-state; account must be taken of the multiple translation activities of a country’s diaspora” (23). Cronin draws from Irish history where he locates three moments in the transnational translation history of Ireland. The first moment is in the medieval period, when the Irish were involved in the revival of Latin as the medium of instruction. Irish monks who were also scholars in Latin, produced translations that connected monasteries in Ireland to other institutions in England and other European countries. The second moment is in the 17th century when the persecution of Irish Catholics led to the founding of Irish colleges in Europe. These places became centres of translation into Irish, and they were influential enough to mould the development of the modern Irish language. The third moment is located in the 20th century and can be perceived in the works of Irish writers like James Joyce, Samuel Beckett and Denis Devlin. Joyce’s idiosyncratic style that used different languages without translation and Beckett who wrote in both French and English, were proving that translation is an integral part of their creative process. The country also had links with far-flung regions in Africa and United States, in the form of missionaries who went on evangelization missions in those places. Cronin underlines the essential mingling of cultures that would have occurred at these historical junctures. He also points out that this transnationalism is not the exclusive privilege of a small country like Ireland. He uses the example of China to illustrate this point.

Instead of going over to a foreign culture like China, it would be better if we tried to look at our own culture to understand the process of cultural mixing that is part of cosmopolitanism. Indian history shows that it is a mistake to link cosmopolitanism with the modern age. Our culture has always been syncretic or a mix of multiple cultures. The encounter of the Indus valley with the invading Aryans must have been the first of our intercultural experiences. We have had waves of invasions after that, with each succeeding invader settling down in this geographical territory to carve out a unique civilization. Sanskrit which was the major language in the ancient period had various regional dialects that in turn generated the growth of full-fledged languages. The other major language was Persian which was brought by the Mughal rulers. Urdu developed as a language out of the encounter of Hindi with Persian. We had, and still have, writers who are equally proficient in two languages. Mirza Ghalib wrote in Persian and Urdu, Premchand in Urdu and Hindi, O. V. Vijayan translated his Malayalam works into English, and Girish Karnad writes both in Kannada and English.

Cosmopolitanism is the essential feature of cultures like these. The translation history of India will straddle many cultures ranging from ancient Greek (think of Alexander’s general Megasthenes who wrote Indica) to contemporary American (writers like Jhumpa Lahiri). This is why we would have to agree with Cronin when he says that a translation history of any country today is bound to be transnational.