Holocaust Testimony and Translation

This seminar will examine the translations and retranslations of Holocaust testimonies, considering the contribution that translation studies research can offer to histories of Holocaust memory

Dr Joanna Rzepa (University of Essex) “Translation and Publishing in Times of War: Tracing the Textual History of Early Holocaust Testimonies”
 
In 1943-1944, several first-hand accounts of the ongoing extermination of Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe were smuggled to the West. Texts such as Camp of Death (1944), Mary Berg’s Warsaw Ghetto: A Diary (1945), and Leon Szalet’s Experiment E (1946) were among the first English-language publications to inform Anglo-American readers of the Jewish plight. This talk explores the textual history of these narratives and their translations, reflecting on their transnational journeys and complex publishing history.

Prof. Peter Davies (University of Edinburgh): “Out with the old? Retranslation as a Problem for Holocaust Testimony: The Case of Elie Wiesel’s La Nuit”

New translations of well-known testimony texts are rare, but they are always an event that signifies well beyond the individual text itself. Elie Wiesel’s La Nuit is unusual in that it has attracted retranslations in more than one language, in editions that have included accounts of the history and pre-history of the text and reflections on language, translation and authenticity.  This talk employs recent Translation Studies scholarship on the issue of retranslation in order to reflect on the multiple versions of La Nuit in English, German and Polish: it shows how retranslations reveal aspects of testimony texts that are often concealed, and demonstrates the potential contribution of translation history more broadly to histories of Holocaust memory.

Speakers:
Prof. Peter Davies is Chair of Modern German Studies at the University of Edinburgh. His research specialisms include Holocaust writing and translation, translation and interpreting studies, and German-language literature and culture.

Dr Joanna Rzepa is Senior Lecturer in Literature at the University of Essex. Her research focuses on the publishing and translation history of Holocaust writing from East-Central Europe.

This meeting of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Literary Studies is a hybrid event, taking place at our Colchester campus and on Zoom.