Life and Aging of Literary Work and of Literary Work in Translation

Abstract

It is not uncommon to assume nowadays that translations are always dated and, therefore, they have a kind of shelf life. In this sense, while original works perpetuate themselves in a form of perennial vitality, manifested in what Walter Benjamin (2011) called its Fortleben, translations of these works manifest the frailty of its provisional and ephemeral condition: it is from this perspective that we will say that translations simply grow old. However, in saying that, aren’t we assuming already that translations too are inscribed in time, and thus that they constitute in themselves a unique and singular form of life? In other words, would not their aging be a sign of the singularity of their form of life, of a form of life like works in themselves? Based on the assumption that, beyond representing a form of life for original works, translations also constitute in themselves a singular form of life (CARDOZO, 2017), this paper aims at discussing some of these issues, in order to rethink the possible meanings of the idea of aging of translations.