[INDOLOGY] Brackets in modern sanskrit translations

Tue Jun 5 22:20:34 UTC 2018

To follow up on Johannes Bronkhorst’s point about readership, it seems obvious that there are two broad categories of readers of translations from Sanskrit texts: Sanskritists and non-Sanskritists. Since the only way non-Sanskritists have access to Sanskrit texts is via translations in the language their are most fluent in (e.g., English, German, Japanese), the question becomes: should Sanskritists serve their own community or the reading academic community at large (to say nothing of the general public)?

Of course, in practice Sanskritists sever both demographics, but despite the good points about honesty, interpretive preferences, and purpose that Alex and Birgit raise, the use of square brackets confounds the non-specialists, and often makes the text a lot less inviting than it actually is. One might be tempted in this context to note that all translation is in some sense an interpretation since, as the late Luis O Gómez once quipped, the "only perfect translation that can be is the original itself."

One solution to this conundrum might be to adopt a two-tiered translation model, with a bracketed version for specialists and one without for the broader academic readership. In some respects, that two-tiered model exists already, which is why the issues was raise in the first place.

Christian Coseru

On Jun 5, 2018, at 4:48 PM, Birgit Kellner via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>> wrote:

I find the positive reasons adduced by Alex also convincing. I am wondering sometimes whether instead of the "translation without brackets" approach it might not be better to begin devising a new genre, one that does not announce itself as "translation", but more of a paraphrase or interpretive rendering which somehow makes transparent (1) that someone renders a Sanskrit text in another language (English or German or ...) and thus follows the logic / narrative and terminology of the text and (2) that interpretative work has gone into this rendering that makes it expressing one among several perhaps equally possible interpretations. Perhaps the problem is not one of how to translate, but that translation is overcharged with too many different and divergent functions, and expectations.

I don't find Dominik's argument to the effect that using brackets in a translation is premised on the assumption that the Sanskrit text is incoherent particularly convincing. Authors of texts make assumptions about what their audience knows, and expect them to fill in gaps. We are at a historical distance from these authors, and which gaps to fill, and how, is interpretative work we have to do, and (now going back to Alex' points about intellectual honesty) it may be advisable to signal where more of this work has been required, for instance, by brackets. This isn't a question of incoherence, it is perhaps a question of recognizing a legitimate multiplicity of different renderings.

Best regards, Birgit Kellner

Am 2018-06-05 um 21:19 schrieb Johannes Bronkhorst via INDOLOGY:
I tend to agree with Alex. Much depends on what readers the translation is for. Since even professional Sanskritists may use translations to inform themselves about texts that are not the focus of their research, these texts better not misinform their readers.
A concrete example may clarify this. Cowell and Gough’s translation of the Sarvadarśanasaṃgraha ends with the words:
“The system of Śaṅkara, which comes next in succession, and which is the crest-gem of all systems, has been explained by us elsewhere; it is therefore left untouched here.”
Editions of the Sarvadarśanasaṃgraha that were made after this translation added a chapter on the “system of Śaṅkara” found in some manuscripts. Subsequently, and perhaps partly because of this translation, most scholars accepted that this final chapter had been composed by the same author.
However, the Sanskrit translated by Cowell and Gough has nothing corresponding to by us. It reads: itaḥ paraṃ sarvadarśanaśiromaṇibhūtaṃ śāṃkaradarśanam anyatra nirūpitam (or: likhitam) ity atropekṣitaṃ. And the question as to the authorship of this chapter remains open. Cowell and Gough might have done their readers, and scholarship, a favour by putting [by us] in brackets.

Johannes Bronkhorst

On 5 Jun 2018, at 20:16, Alex Watson via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>> wrote:

I found Dominik's list of reasons for using brackets incomplete / one-sided.
I would include at least the two following positive reasons.

1. While brackets may disrupt the flow for readers who are not also looking at the Sanskrit, they are helpful for those who are comparing your translation with the Sanskrit.  (Since translations of most Sanskrit philosophical texts, especially the more technical ones, are extremely difficult to understand without simultaneously looking at the Sanskrit, I find the use of brackets in the translation of philosophical texts more desirable than undesirable.)

2. Intellectual honesty.  Use of brackets signals what follows straightforwardly from the Sanskrit, and what is the result of addition or interpretation on your part – which English etc. words correspond to Sanskrit words, and what you have chosen to add in to complete the sense, to disambiguate, or to make explicit to the reader what would have remained obscure if you had just stuck to rendering the Sanskrit words.

Best
Alex

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From: Dominik Wujastyk <wujastyk at gmail.com<mailto:wujastyk at gmail.com>>
To: Harry Spier <hspier.muktabodha at gmail.com<mailto:hspier.muktabodha at gmail.com>>
Cc: Indology <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>>
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Date: Sun, 3 Jun 2018 20:23:19 -0600
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Brackets in modern sanskrit translations
Your question presses a big red button for me :-)  My thoughts are here<https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcikitsa.blogspot.com%2F2016%2F04%2Fon-use-of-parentheses-in-translation.html&data=02%7C01%7C%7C792c011ed1ea42154edc08d5cb25c1da%7Ce285d438dbba4a4c941c593ba422deac%7C0%7C0%7C636638285386269930&sdata=3Fg36ZQaldIL3%2FPfFe0AKn21lYGKjuPebEhEsAQj784%3D&reserved=0>.

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