MARGUERITE DURAS: SOME PROBLEMS TO THE TRANSLATION

Abstract

Marguerite Duras’ work is apparently simple: a simple vocabulary, often colloquial, plenty of dialogues and short phrases. But the facility of the syntax and the “similarity of the language” hide a language that comprehends the author’s intricate inner world. We can stress out that the most part of the translations of Marguerite Duras’ works into Portuguese puts her works “at the service of the reader”, following a way of “literality” that does not contemplate a “higher language” in which one could hear “the echo of the origin-nal language resurrected”, as Benjamin proposes (BENJAMIN 2008: 25-49). In this article, we will examine some problems that appear in the translations from French into Portuguese in Moderato Cantabile (1959), O deslumbramento (Le Ravissement de Lol V. Stein, 1964), and O Vice-cônsul (1966). We will be able to verify that it is required to the translator, not only the knowledge of the source language and the target language, but also the deep know-ledge of the author and the nature of his work (cf. Benjamin). Thus “the translation of poetry (or similar prose) is an inner experience of the world and the technic of the translated” (DE CAMPOS 2001: 43, apud GERONIMO 2017).