Posted on October 22, 2009 by Scott Esposito

(Here we offer an interview with Breon Mitchell on his retranslation of Gunter Grass’s classic novel The Tin Drum. Mitchell will be in the Bay Area for two events in November with the Center for the Art of Translation. On Tuesday, November 10, he’ll expand on his remarks here at our Lit&Lunch event at 111 Minna Gallery. And on Monday, November 9, Mitchell will be reading and mingling—along with numerous other translators—at our book release party for Wherever I Lie Is Your Bed, which includes an excerpt from his new translation, as well as Mitchell’s translator’s introduction to the piece. Full event info here. And to stay on top of all our events, news, interviews, and translator articles, join our Facebook group.)

Scott Esposito: How did you get involved in doing the retranslation of The Tin Drum? Was this a text you’d long wanted to work on?

Breon Mitchell: I had just finished translating Marcel Beyer’s Spies for Harcourt and they asked me if I would be willing to retranslate The Tin Drum for its 50th anniversary. At first I said no, because I was having eye problems at the time and wasn’t sure I could take on a new project. But I loved the novel, and was offered the chance to join Grass in Gdansk for one of his famous translator’s gatherings—an offer I couldn’t refuse!

SE: Was this your first retranslation? How would you differentiate between doing a book that has never before been translated and doing a retranslation?

I had already retranslated Franz Kafka’s The Trial for Schocken Books in 1998—a task of at least equal magnitude. That was my only prior experience with retranslating a work I knew well (and had taught for many years). In both cases, the existing translations were themselves classics (Edwin and Willa Muir’s translation of Kafka, and Ralph Manheim’s translation of The Tin Drum). Translating an author for the first time has its own special rewards, but creating a new version of a classic text puts the translator in touch with literary tradition in a unique way.

SE: In his review of your translation, Michael Dirda notes that in your afterword to The Tin Drum you write that “The works that are never retranslated are those we only care to read once.” What makes The Tin Drum a book that we should read more than once?

BM: The most powerful works of literature compel us to reread them—and often more than once. The effect they produce is a combination of linguistic artistry and richness of meaning. The Tin Drum treats universal themes (the father-son conflict, youth and art, sexual awakening, guilt and atonement) against the background of one of the most terrible moments of European history. The result is a stunning work of art—shocking and provocative, complex and innovative, richly rewarding.

SE: Dirda also quotes you as saying “the new version I offer is meant for our present age, one that is increasingly open to the foreignness of the text, to the provocative innovation of linguistic play, to a syntactic complexity that stretches language.” What is it about our present age (or perhaps about the status Grass and The Tin Drum have attained as contemporary classics) that makes you think now is the time for a more foreign and syntactically complex Tin Drum?

BM: In the fifty years that have passed since The Tin Drum first appeared, literary translation itself has undergone a transformation—one which has consciously foregrounded translation itself. We no longer feel the need to domesticate translations for the English-language reader. Our culture is increasingly global, and the audience for foreign literature seems to enjoy translations that reflect more closely the tone and substance of the original.

SE: How familiar are you with Ralph Manheim’s original translation of The Tin Drum, and did you consult it (or try to avoid it) while making your own translation?

BM: I knew Ralph Manheim in his later years, and I knew his translation well. It was the translation I myself read before I could read Grass in the original. Encountering his Tin Drum was one of the crucial moments of my literary life. Later, as a professor, I used Ralph’s version in comparative literature classes on many occasions. It is a beautiful translation by a master of the craft. When I sat down to do my own version, I put Ralph’s completely aside. Once I was finished, I checked every sentence against his to see if we agreed on the basic meaning. Over the course of revision and editing Drenka Willen and I often referred back to see what Ralph had done in a difficult passage. But inevitably my translation reflected my own reading of the text, and my own sense of loyalty to it.

SE: It’s been widely noted that you spent a week in Danzig with Grass and numerous other translators, who were simultaneously translating The Tin Drum into languages other than English. Did you have any conversation with those translators, any linguistic cross-fertilization that you found helpful in your English-language translation?

BM: Our week in Gdansk was very special for all of us—translators and author alike. Each day Grass sat down with us, read aloud from the text, pointed out difficult passages on practically every page, and allowed us to ask any questions we wished. Even though all sessions were conducted in German, the variety of questions, given the range of ten European languages, was fascinating. The issues raised were ones we all shared, regardless of our language. But there was seldom a case in which solutions proposed in one language were of any real help in another. What helped, in light of the normal isolation of literary translators, was to feel part of something larger than ourselves.

SE: And finally, do you think Grass’s other novels should also be retranslated? Are there any in particular that you think would benefit from a retranslation?

BM: I’ve always felt than any great work of literature should be constantly retranslated, since every translation, no matter how successful, is only one reading of the original text. Grass, however, was blessed with wonderful translators: Ralph Manheim, John E. Woods, Krishna Winston, and Michael Henry Heim have all produced fine versions of his prose. If any of his other novels are eventually retranslated, it will not be because of failings in the earlier translators, but simply from a desire to hear Grass’s voice in yet another tone.