Abstract

This dissertation essentially tries to present a 'new' poetic genre: the Spoken Word. We will explore and examine several translation challenges that occur within the translation in order to better redefine and analyze translation processes and strategies. We will rely on theories related with poetry (Henri Meschonnic and André Lefevere), theater (Susan Bassnett and George Wellwarth) and performance (Charles Bernstein) to support our analysis. Spoken word takes its source in oral literature. This genre is not so new, but is rather a more modern form, a more active sibling of the reading poetry and a reincarnation of fusion poetry. An exploration of performance features and its relations with poetry, theater, memorization, reception, text instability, as well as relations between the original and the translation, musicality and audio support, will allow developing a translation project. We will introduce a spoken word artist of Montreal: Catherine Kidd. The analysis of the original text, Sea Peach, will raise various problems and challenges. Will we translate a spoken word as a traditional poem? What are the translation strategies to be used? For whom do we translate? Will the translation affect the performance? Translation will be done beyond the text and will have an even more creative and performative extent.

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