Translation trauma

In a recent column in the NST, Translations help broaden our horizons, on Saturday, June 23rd, Dato' Johan Jaafar, wrote about the paucity of translated works in this country when compared to Thailand or Indonesia. He does not say it outright, he is too polite, but the implications are clear: that there is a direct relationship between parochialism amongst Malaysians (simply listen to some of the things our politicians say) and our lack of reading and access to the world. We have become one with the proverbial katak. Literature and writings broaden horizons. That is given. No arguments there. In fact, what is embarrassing is that we should be it in this day. (Hello, look at the calendar, it says 2007.)

Two recent translations into Malay were Herman Hesse's Siddhartha and Jostein Gardner's Sophie's World, both by ITNM. While they are most welcome, they only managed to highlight the problem. I went into their website to find out more about the translators. It says on the website, 'The Malaysian National Institute of Translation (Institut Terjemahan Negara Malaysia or ITNM) is a limited company established by the government of Malaysia on 14 September 1993. Its share capital is wholly owned by the Ministry of Finance while its administration is managed by the Ministry of Education.' I looked under their 'eCatalogue' link and found that two (2) books were translated and published in 1995, 26 in 1997, 2 in 1998, 14 in 2003, and 20 in 2004. (I suspect the website has not been updated since then, which is not very surprising.) That would make it 62 books in 11 years (5.6 books a year) - the vast majority of them looked like school textbooks. In comparison, the (undated) paper by Saran Kaur Gill of UKM entitled Language Policy And Planning In Higher Education in Malaysia, says that from 1959 to 1995, a period of 39 years, Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, translated 374 books (9.6 books a year). (The national Book Trust of India, established in 1957, does 800 a year.)

Both the figures are obviously not grand - in total less than 600 books have been translated (including 160 Saran Kaur Gill quotes for the various universities) in the last 50 years. (How many million ringgit would that be for each book? Anyone have the figures?) No wonder we are so parochial. And how are we supposed to compete with the world, again?

I would, at this point, like to relate a personal experience. I was at a meeting at Dewan Bahasa once. On the way back I decided to pop into the bookshop to see if they still had a Malay translation of (Nobel laureate) Rabindranath Tagore's Gitanjali by Latiff Mohidin. They did, four copies. I decided to get two because they were only RM6.00 each. So cheap, I thought. But I was in for a surprise. When I went up to the cashier to pay, she told me that there was a discount on 'old' books and she charged me RM1.80 a copy! This was the translation of one of the most important works in modern world literature, by one of Malaysia's most important poets (and painter), and it was being sold like paper lama! I would have gladly paid RM18.00 or RM24.00 for it. And the sadder story is that you will not find a copy of this book in any of our Malaysian bookshops. Talk about a society that does not value its writers or their books. What national culture are we talking about?

I have said it several times and I have said this to the top brass at Dewan: I would love to stock books by Dewan Bahasa at Silverfish Books, but how do I get hold of them? An American customer made this observation: walk into any bookshop in Kuala Lumpur and you see them filled with imported books from the UK and the US. Where are your local books? At the bottom shelf in the back of the shop, if at all. This is a bizarre country.

Comparisons with other countries are always fraught with danger. But Dato Johan's point out: "In Indonesia, by contrast, there are cases of books launched in London or New York being published simultaneously in Bahasa Indonesia. In fact, on the streets of Jakarta translated books are hawked as aggressively as local pulp fiction."

As for promoting Malaysian literature worldwide in translation … don't even get me started on that.

Full story: http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Saturday/Columns/20070623084142/Article/pppull_index_html