User:Bethan.wolfe/Sandbox

The project "Visualising Version Variation: Case Study On Translations Of Shakespeare’s Othello " explores, using advanced technology, how and why there can be so much variation between different translations of the same source text. It was initiated by Dr. Tom Cheesman, a member of staff at the Department of Modern Languages at University of Swansea (Wales, UK), and its investigations are focussed on the works of Shakespeare.

'''Why Shakespeare? '''

Many literary works are regularly translated afresh and into many different languages. The translations often display striking differences despite the source text being largely identical.In order to explore how these differences come about the colleagues on the research team are focussing on the works of William Shakespeare. His works are particularly well-suited to this type of research as some of his works have been translated into 100 languages and there are more than 80 different translations of Shakespeare into German alone.

Team and Research Method

The initial phase of the project is concentrating on studying one small excerpt from Shakespeare's play Othello. On the website for the project the team encourages experts, students, translators or anyone interested to submit their translations of the following two lines which present particular linguistic and interprative challenges:


 * If virtue no delighted beauty lack,
 * Your son-in-law is far more fair than black.
 * (Act 1, Scene 3, Open Source Shakespeare, Lines 646-7)

Dr. Tom Cheesman says: If you have a translation of Othello on your bookshelf or find a copy in your local library please send us these two lines along with a literal translation into English. We already have 150 versions in 22 languages which we can work with. We hope to be able to collate more than 300 versions in 100 languages. Using 'Crowd-Sourcing' we can create a global snapshot of when, where and how Othella is being retranslated. Then it is possible for us to create animated visualiations so that people can go online and browse through various versions.

Version which are currently in print:


 * If valour is the measure of true beauty, your son-in-law is fairer than he’s black.


 * If goodness is beautiful, your son-in-law is beautiful, not black.

Technology & Crowd-Sourcing

Crowd-Sourcing will also aid the building of an online community of students and experts who are interested in the topic of variation in translation. As the project develops further it is hoped that there will be increasing opportunities for collaboration.

In order to be able to analyse the differences between different translations of Shakespeare the research team at the University of Swansea are developing tools which will aid visualisation of the data. Digital visualisation will reveal hidden patterns in the texts, enable new approaches to the texts and could become a masterpiece in its own right.

References