On Crossing Barriers: Contemporary Caribbean Women Poets in Translation

Authors

  • Maria Grau Perejoan University of the Balearic Islands
  • Loretta Collins Klobah University of Puerto Rico

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1344/co20213023-33

Keywords:

poetry, Caribbean poetry, translation

Abstract

As Luise von Flotow already emphasized more than two decades ago in her work  Translation and Gender: Translating in the ‘Era of Feminism’ (1997), often times feminist translators try to assume the responsibility of offering a critical reflection to their readers about their process, diverse methods and philosophies of translation. From our stance as feminist translators, we offer here a critical reflection on the process of collectively translating the bilingual anthology of poetry The Sea Needs No Ornament/ El mar no necesita ornamento (2020), accompanied by a sample of four poems by four of the thirty-three contemporary Caribbean women poets included. In this way, this paper contextualizes and offers a glimpse into the bilingual anthology of contemporary Caribbean women poets we have edited and translated from a feminist as well as a postcolonial perspective. 

Author Biographies

Maria Grau Perejoan, University of the Balearic Islands

Maria Grau Perejoan is a lecturer and a literary translator. She holds a doctoral degree in Cultural Studies with an emphasis on Caribbean Literature and Literary Translation from the University of Barcelona, and an MPhil in Cultural Studies from the University of the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago. She was visiting lecturer at the UWI, St Augustine Campus for three academic years, she then moved on to lecture courses in Translation and Caribbean Literature at the University of Barcelona, and since 2020 she is a Lecturer at the Department of Spanish, Modern and Classical Languages at the University of the Balearic Islands.

Loretta Collins Klobah, University of Puerto Rico

Loretta Collins Klobah’s first book The Twelve Foot Neon Woman (Peepal Tree Press, 2011) received the OCM Bocas Prize in Caribbean Literature in the category of poetry and was short-listed for the Felix Dennis Prize in the Forward Prize series. Her second book Ricantations (Peepal Tree Press, 2018) was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and a National Poetry Day selection. It was long-listed for the Bocas Prize. She has been awarded the Pushcart Prize, the Earl Lyons Award from The Academy of American Poets, and the Pam Wallace Award for an Aspiring Woman Writer. Her poems have been widely published in journals and anthologies. She lives in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where she is a professor of Caribbean literature and creative writing at the University of Puerto Rico.

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Published

2021-06-03