Translation and Ideology

Translation has often been used by feminists to promote their ideology. In India, the two-volume anthology Women Writing in India (edited by Susie Tharu and K. Lalita) is a case in point. This work resurrected lesser known and in some cases unknown women writers from India, mainly through translations. In Europe, early feminists like Mary Wollstonecraft (1759 – 97) translated works that promoted the cause of women. Her work Vindication of the Rights of Women was translated into German by Henriette Herz and became one of the founding ideological works for the feminist movement in Germany.

Translation was used for political purposes by Margaret Fuller and Madame de Staël, both translators of the 19th century. Lady Augusta Gregory (1852 – 193) was closely associated with the Gaelic Revival and the Abbey Theatre in Irish literature. Besides being a writer herself, she translated folklore from Irish to English with the intention of bringing the native vigour of Irish to English. Eleanor Marx-Aveling (1855 – 98), the daughter of Karl Marx, was a social activist and translator. Her translations from French and Norwegian were primarily politically motivated. She translated Flaubert’s Madame Bovary from French with the intention of undermining conventional British morality. She learnt Norwegian so that she could translate Ibsen into English. These translations were motivated by the desire to undermine established concepts of women’s rights and their position in society.

Thus, these translators viewed translation as a medium through which they could propagate their beliefs about gender equality and social progress.