Anton Shammas’s translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa

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Babel 57: 1 (2011), 76–98. © Fédération des Traducteurs (fit) Revue Babeldoi 10.1075/babel.57.1.05kay issn 0521–9744 e-issn 1569–9668

From left to right and from right to leftAnton Shammas’s translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa*

Mahmoud KayyalTel-Aviv University

1. Introduction: Hegemony and translation

Any discussion about Anton Shammas’s (b. 1950) translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa mandates reference to the influences of majority-minority relations and cultural and political hegemony on translation. On the face of it, ma-jority-minority relations in the present case are not unequivocal, since the Arab-Palestinian minority living in Israel belongs to the Arab majority that surrounds it, and since the two languages involved in these translations are considered “weak” in comparison to “metropolitan” languages. Nevertheless, it is difficult to ignore the fact that a political, social and economic hegemony of the Jewish majority over the Arab minority actively exists in Israel. Moreover, Hebrew/Jewish/Zionist/Is-raeli culture is perceived by many Arab intellectuals as part of the hegemonic and neocolonial Western culture. In any event, the fact that Shammas is a bilingual author who abandoned writing in his Arabic mother tongue in favor of writing in Hebrew, reinforces the need to discuss the impact of the balance of power between the two cultures on his translations. Several translation researchers have devoted special attention to the influen-ces of majority-minority relations on translation between the language of the ma-jority and that of the minority. Gideon Toury (1985: 3–4), for example, asserts that minority languages are weak by definition, not only in contrast with the major-ity language in the same society, but also in contrast with most source languages. When translating into a minority language, translation brings about changes in the target language, whereas when the minority language constitutes a majority language in another society, such as Arabic in Israel as opposed to Arabic in the Arab States, or Swedish in Finland as opposed to Swedish in Sweden, this situation

* This research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (Grant no. 661/08).

© 2011. Fédération des Traducteurs (fit) Revue BabelAll rights reserved

From left to right and from right to left 77

raises the prestige of that language in the minority society and enriches it through linguistic means. In these instances translation does not necessarily bring about changes in the target language. Other translation researchers viewed translation as an activity typified by power irrespective of majority-minority relations in a given society. André Lefe-vere, followed by additional researchers who addressed the historical-cultural as-pects of translation, suggested focusing on the extra-literary influences on trans-lation in order to show how the ideological component restricts literary discourse. Lefevere coined the term “refracted text” to describe “texts that have been pro-cessed for a certain audience (children, for example), or adapted to a certain poet-ics or a certain ideology” (Lefevere 1981: 72). In conjunction with Susan Bassnett, he also suggested studying the significance of employing belligerence to create cul-ture, part of which is translation (Bassnett & Lefevere 1990: 5). However, most of these researchers are postcolonial critics who did not ac-cept the traditional standpoint which viewed translation as part of understanding the “other”. They perceived translation first and foremost as a powerful connec-tion whereby the function of the translated texts is to impose hegemonic cultural values on the dominated peoples while obscuring colonial violence (Evans 1998: 153). Tejaswini Niranjana, too, accuses translation research of disregarding not only the power typifying translation, but also the historical facts connected with the publication of translated texts. In her research, Niranjana attempts to show how translated texts constitute a tool in the hands of colonial regimes. She asserts that, “Translation thus produces strategies of containment. By employing certain modes of representing the other [. . .] translation reinforces hegemonic versions of the colonized” (Niranjana 1992: 3). Richard Jacquemond (1992: 155–6), who discussed the connection between cultural hegemony and translation with refer-ence to translation from French into Arabic, indicates the sociopolitical aspects of translation. He maintains that in a colonial situation the translator is viewed as a

“servile mediator” or as an “authoritative mediator”. In contrast, in a postcolonial situation translation is viewed as an example of “Occidentalism” or as a process of representation of non-Western cultures. In order to examine the connection between hegemony and translation, and the validity of the translation paradigms mentioned above in the context of Sham-mas’s translations, we will focus on his transition from translating Modern Hebrew literature into Arabic to translating in the opposite direction, from Modern Arab-ic literature into Hebrew. This transition will be examined not only in comparison with his parallel transition from original writing in Arabic into original writing in Hebrew, but also in light of the ideological change that occurred in his attitude to the Israeli establishment and the Zionist consensus with regard to Israeli identity and the status of the Arab-Palestinian minority in Israel.


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It should be noted at this juncture that Shammas also translated English litera-ture into Arabic and Hebrew and Arabic literature into English, but these transla-tions merit a separate study and are of less interest to us here in light of the research questions presented above. In any event, the stages and components of his trans-lations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa will be examined: the translated works, his considerations for their selection, the bodies involved in their publica-tion, the translation policies he adopted, how the translations were received by the target culture, and Shammas’ own attitude toward his translations.

2. “Reverse Transparencies”: Shammas’s translations from Hebrew into Arabic

During the 1960s and 70s Shammas was one of the most prominent translators of Modern Hebrew literature into Arabic. Up to the 1960s, this activity was dom-inated by Jewish translators of Arab extraction, and most were key functionaries of the establishment within the Arab population in Israel. Translators such as Eli-yahu Agassi (b. 1909), Binyamin Zakai (b. 1927) and Meir Hadad (b. 1910) em-phasized the importance of their activities in strengthening ties and friendly re-lations between Jews and Arabs. However, an examination of their inventory of translations and an in-depth study of the translated texts reveal that above all else their translations reflected their commitment to Zionist ideology, or to paraphrase Lefevere, their translations were “refracted texts”. The change that occurred post-1967 in the attitude of the establishment to-ward Arabic cultural and literary life in Israel, which was manifested in a reduc-tion of direct supervision over cultural life and lifting some of the restrictions im-posed on printed matter, enabled young Arabs, like Shammas, who were already conversant with Hebrew to enter the sphere of translation. He and his colleagues ultimately contributed toward changing the face of translation, to reducing its commitment to Zionist ideology, and to removing it from the direct supervision of the establishment.

2.1. Inventory of translations

Most of Shammas’s translations were published in the literary journal al-Sharq, which also functioned as a publishing house. The first of his translations to be pub-lished (1972) was an anthology of children’s stories and poems entitled al-Safrah ilā jazīrat yumkin (The Journey to the Maybe Island) by Miriam Yalan-Shtekelis (1900–1984). Yalan-Shtekelis is considered one of the most prominent authors of Hebrew children’s literature. Many of her poems were put to music and became



inalienable assets of Israeli children’s songs. The translation was rendered at the request and with the encouragement of the author, who even raised the funds for this purpose. In her introduction, handwritten in cursive Arabic although she did not know the language, she addresses the Arab target audience with expressions of love and hope for peace between the two peoples. The anthology comprises ten poems and two stories for children selected from various books by Yalan-Shtekelis. The poems were translated into spoken Arabic (Āmmiyyah), whereas the two stor-ies were rendered into literary Arabic (Fuṣḥā). Shammas went on to edit a special issue of the literary journal al-Sharq, which was published in 1973 and consisted of numerous translated Hebrew literary texts. The special issue included 100 poems and 13 literary works, some of which were partial translations of novels. Most translated Hebrew authors are important and prominent authors in Modern Hebrew literature. The works selected for transla-tion were primarily written in the 1960s and early 70s and consequently reflected a current profile of the stylistic, ideological and thematic characteristics of Modern Hebrew literature. Most of the works and poems included in the issue were trans-lated into literary Arabic, and only a few poems were translated into spoken Arab-ic, as opposed to the translation policy Shammas adopted in the Yalan-Shtekelis anthology, where all the poems were translated into spoken Arabic. The fact that these were poems for adults apparently led to his favoring the literary language over the spoken. In 1975 al-Sharq published another of Shammas’s translations; his translation of the novel by Yehiel Dinur (Ka-Tzetnik) (1917 [1909?]-2001), Kawkab al-ramād (Star of Dust) (1966). Dinur, a Holocaust survivor, wrote about the Holocaust of Euro-pean Jewry in all his works and even adopted the nom de plume Ka-Tzetnik, which in Yiddish and German means “concentration camp inmate”. His translated novel focuses on the harsh experiences of life in Auschwitz, the Nazi concentration camp. Shammas’s departure from the editorial board of al-Sharq in 1975 did not pre-vent his continued collaboration with the journal on translation matters. His trans-lation of an anthology of poems entitled Min ṣaīf ilā ṣaīf (From Summer to Sum-mer) by David Rokeah (1916–1985) was published in 1977 by al-Sharq. Rokeah’s poems were translated into various languages and gained great acclaim overseas, especially in Germany and Switzerland. However, in Israel he was not regarded as an important poet and gained little recognition. The poet apparently managed to find funding to publish his anthology in Arabic from an institution named VLF Near Eastern Publications London, which is acknowledged in the anthology for providing assistance with publishing. Parallel to his work with al-Sharq, Shammas edited a bilingual Arabic-Hebrew anthology consisting of the original and translated works of the participants in the Arab and Jewish Poets and Authors Conference that was held in 1974 at Bait al-


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Karmah / Beit Hagefen in Haifa. The anthology, entitled Biṣout muzdawaj (In Bi-lingual Voice), had limited distribution despite the fact that various organizations joined forces to publish it. These organizations, headed by Bait al-Karmah / Beit Hagefen in Haifa, are renowned for encouraging understanding and coexistence between Jews and Arabs in Israel. However, the lion’s share of the financial support for the anthology’s publication was received from the Public Council of Culture and Art, which is affiliated to the Israel Ministry of Education and Culture. The anthology comprises, divided almost equally, 38 Arabic and Hebrew works pre-sented in their source language alongside their translations into the other. Sham-mas translated all but six of the works, which were translated by other translators. Some of the works translated from Hebrew into Arabic were published in the spe-cial issue of al-Sharq mentioned above. The second volume of this anthology was published in 1976, however, this time only the Arabic texts were accompanied by translations, whereas the Hebrew texts appeared in their source language without translations. The organizers may have assumed at the outset, from a hegemonic approach, that the Arab authors who participate in encounters with their Jewish counterparts are supposedly con-versant with Hebrew, whereas Jewish authors are not conversant with Arabic. Consequently, translations from Hebrew into Arabic were deemed unnecessary. Shammas’s interest in Modern Hebrew poetry, and especially in poets who in-troduced thematic and stylistic innovations, led him to translate an anthology of poems entitled Idhāah min qamar iṣṭināī (Cryptograms from a Telestar) by Da-vid Avidan (1934–1995), who was considered a bold and innovative poet. Avidan, who actively sought to have his works translated into Arabic and had previously published two anthologies, one which he edited and the other which he wrote, that were translated into Arabic by Mahmoud Baidasi (b. 1932), in 1970, succeeded in enlisting various organizations to publish this anthology in 1982. In addition to Thirtieth Century Press, which is owned by the poet, other bodies involved in pub-lishing the anthology were al-Sarouji Publishing House in Acre, which undertook the printing and distribution, the Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Litera-ture (founded in 1962), which undertook the funding and financial support, and the Department of Arabic Language and Literature at Tel Aviv University. Sasson Somekh (b. 1933) initiated a project of translations into Arabic in 1984 entitled “Echoes of Modern Hebrew Culture” with the participation of the De-partment of Arabic Language and Literature at Tel Aviv University, al-Mashriq Publishing House in Shefaram (al-Sharq’s successor), and the Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature. As part of the project, a literary anthology was published, entitled Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah: 12 qiṣṣah min al-adab al-ibrī al-ḥadith (The Doe Hunt: 12 Stories from Modern Hebrew Literature), which Shammas edit-ed. The anthology comprised translations that had previously been published in



other publications: the special issue of al-Sharq in 1973, and the anthology Biṣout muzdawaj (1974). Shammas’s introduction to this anthology reflects some of his translational considerations and proclivities. He stresses that it was not his intention to select works that deal with the Israeli-Arab conflict or to provide representation for the various schools of Modern Hebrew literature, but rather to open a window for the Arab reader onto the world of Modern Hebrew literature. He added that the ma-jority of works were written in the 1960s and early 1970s, hence they presented stylistic and thematic innovation and indicated new trends. Following a brief his-torical review, he also elaborated on the distinctiveness of each work as well as the status and importance of each author included in the anthology. Finally, he raised a number of speculations regarding possible similarities between Hebrew and Arabic literature in the Modern Era, particularly since both were influenced, in his opinion, by European literatures (Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 7–10). In any event, the impression gained from the above review is that Shammas’s motivation for translating Hebrew works primarily stemmed from his admira-tion of Modern Hebrew literature, which creates, in his opinion, opportunities for an encounter with “unfamiliar mappings of experience”, just like world literature (Shammas 1976: 7). On the other hand, however, it is difficult to ignore the fact that the translated works were chosen at the initiative, encouragement and fund-ing of various bodies in the source Hebrew culture and organizations associated with or supported by the Israeli establishment. In this context, the literary journal al-Sharq is worthy of note. Being under the aegis of the government daily newspa-per al-Anbā significantly increased the probability of direct or indirect influence by the establishment on the translations. It is hardly surprising that in thematic terms the translated works are “convenient” for the establishment and represent the mainstream of Hebrew literature and culture. The authors, too, played a role in selecting the works for translation, in raising funds to finance the translation and publicity, as well as in the publishing process. Their involvement attests to the importance they attributed to the translation of their works into Arabic and to the contribution of these translations to rapproche-ment with their Arab neighbors. Shammas himself took a cynical view of the con-tradiction between this lofty objective and their ignorance of Arabic, which surely does not contribute to rapprochement and dialog with their Arab neighbors:

Authors with whom I was in contact in the course of the translations did not under-stand a word of the new language in which their works were clad. Their ignorance, I am compelled to say, was cloaked in remarkable politeness. However, one author ex-pressed her indignation that her translated work concludes with an exclamation point rather than the period that concludes it in the original. I later discovered that I had mistakenly sent her the printout of another author (Shammas 1985: 19).


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The various bodies mentioned above were involved in the translation for a variety of motivations, but the principal ones were apparently as follows:A. A desire to provide translations that would faithfully represent the main-

stream of Hebrew literature and culture to the Arabic-reading audiences in Is-rael and the Arab world.

B. Dissatisfaction with the translations of Hebrew literature into Arabic that were being rendered in the Arab world. This translation activity was considered tendentious due to the preference for Hebrew works that reflected a hostile stance toward Arabs, or leveled criticism at Israeli society, and due to the se-lection of marginal works from Hebrew literature. Furthermore, the transla-tors themselves were regarded as lacking proficiency in the Hebrew language and were accused of multiple translational mistakes and egregious errors in their comprehension of the Hebrew texts (Ghanayim 1984).

C. A belief that such translations could provide an opportunity to become ac-quainted with Hebrew culture and thus contribute to advancing the dialog and understanding between Arabs and Jews who are embroiled in a prolonged and bloody conflict and adverse relations attended by ethnic, social and polit-ical tensions.

2.2. Translation policy

Shammas’s translation policy was typified by an inclination toward adequate translation and working on small units. This policy resulted in non-uniformity of language and style in his translations, in permeation of cultural and linguistic fea-tures from the source culture and language into the translated text, and frequent deviations from the accepted linguistic, stylistic and ethical norms of the target culture. In effect, the linguistic interference of Hebrew, which is mainly extant in the spoken language of the Arab population in Israel, is significantly manifested in various norms in Shammas’s translations: disregarding the rules of Arabic lexicog-raphy; preserving Hebrew grammatical structures; multiple semantic borrowings and neologisms; using Hebrew words in Arabic transliteration; using phonetically similar words to those in the original, etc. A study of Shammas’s translations reveals numerous examples of these norms. Thus for example, the following neologism can be found to convert a noun, appar-ently because he believed there was a semantic void in Arabic with regard to this noun, despite the existence of a word in Arabic with the same semantic meaning:1

1. In a later publication of the translation, Shammas reconsidered his use of the neologism and used the standard word dafīah (Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 76).



ST: chamama (greenhouse) (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 178)TT: al-mukhtaĀarah al-tadfiiyah (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 202)2

Also to be found in his translations is a translational borrowing of a fixed col-location in Hebrew, although this is non-standard in Arabic:

ST: nafal bechelki (fell in my lot) (Bartov 1973: 81)TT: saqaṭ fī naṣībī (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 37; Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 31)

He also had no qualms about splitting idioms or fixed collocations in Arab-ic. Thus for example, in order to translate a simple sentence, he split the idiomatic fixed collocation jāou alā bikrat abīhim (They came every last one), and tried to create a new collocation that appears odd and distorted to the Arabic reader:

ST: dlatot vechalonot neekru metzireihen (doors and windows were uprooted from their hinges) (Bartov 1973: 81)

TT: al-abwāb wal-shabābīk khuliat an bikrat maḥāwirihā (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 37; Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 31).

Shammas also used borrowed lexemes from the Hebrew, such as:

ST: mikourzal (frizzy) (Kaniuk 1979: 13)TT: mukarzal (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 238; Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 89).

This borrowed lexeme is constructed according to the Arabic grammatical rules of ism al-mafoul (passive present participle), so that to the reader it appears as a word in Arabic, especially in light of its phonetic resemblance to the verb kar-zam (ate for half the day) in classical literary Arabic (Fuṣḥā). Furthermore, he preferred using words in Arabic that phonetically and etymo-logically resemble words in the Hebrew source, such as:

ST: perper (fluttered) (Yehoshua 1970: 171)TT: farfar (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 116)

But it is important to note that the semantic meaning of the Arabic verb is similar to that of the Hebrew verb only in spoken Arabic (Āmmiyah), whereas in Fuṣḥā it means “hurried”. Features from Hebrew culture that encountered semantic voids in the Arab target culture, i.e., lacking a word that accurately expresses the same seman-tic meaning extant in the source culture, were preserved in the translated text in Arabic transliteration. Thus, for example, he transliterated the word goyim (Gen-tiles) into Arabic without elaborating on the unique meaning of the word in Jew-ish culture:

2. ST= Source Text; TT=Target Text.


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ST: goyim (Gentiles) (Kaniuk 1979: 18)TT: ghuyim (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 242; Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 93)

In his translations Shammas does not adhere to the ethical norm of employ-ing language that is free of crudity and erotic descriptions as mandated by con-servative Arab society. Thus, for example, when a word taken from Arabic slang sharmouṭa (whore) appears in the Hebrew source text, Shammas does not hesitate to use the Arabic slang word al-sharmouṭa, and disregards the fact that the word is considered exceptionally crude in Arabic. Moreover, later in the translated text he uses the Arabic slang verb derived from the same crude slang word bitsharmiṭ (whoring), despite the available options of using words of a more delicate nature that are accepted in the Arabic target literature to express the same meaning:

ST: sharmouta (whore); mezdanzent (whoring) (Kaniuk 1979: 22, 26)TT: al-sharmouṭa; bitsharmiṭ (Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 246, 249; Ṣaiyd al-

ghazālah 1984: 96, 99).

2.3. How the Arab target culture received Shammas’s translations and his own attitude toward them

Shammas’s translations attained a marginal status in the Arabic target literature, which was manifested in various ways:A. Limited or absence of interest by Arab literary critics in Israel to these trans-

lations. The few reviews that were written were mostly published in plat-forms associated with the establishment, identified with the establishment, or written in Hebrew. However, even these reviews of the translations were uncomplimentary and mostly took exception to Shammas’s neologisms and borrowings: “Despite his admirable efforts to render an accurate and faith-ful translation into Arabic, Anton Shammas tends toward over-boldness with neologisms by using words not yet in use in Arabic and detached from the rules of Arabic lexicography” (Moreh 1979: 326).

B. Lack of interest in these translations resulted in them being published in a lim-ited number of platforms that were either associated with the establishment or dedicated to translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa. How-ever, even when they were published, this was executed hastily and carelessly, with neither critics nor readers bothering to point out the errors and omis-sions in them. This was the case with Shammas’s translation of the poem Ye-rusha (Inheritance) by Haim Gouri (1988), which appeared in its entirety in the special issue of al-Sharq (1973: 18) mentioned above. Some ten years later the translation was published in two separate books containing other transla-tions from Hebrew literature into Arabic (Araidi 1984: 93–4; Khir 1993: 56).



However, in both books almost half the poem is omitted and “pasted” onto an-other of Gouri’s poems, Odysseus, which was also translated by Shammas and appeared in all three. Surprisingly, none of the critics, readers or editors of the two books noticed this error.

C. There was very little interest in these translations in the Arab world. The few reviews that were written about them were scathing and acerbic. Thus, for ex-ample, in 1986 the Egyptian journal al-Mawqif al-Arabī (The Arab Opinion) published a short article entitled “Against Normalization”. The article, which came 14 years (!) late, presented the anthology of translated children’s stor-ies and poems by Miriam Yalan-Shtekelis mentioned earlier, as an attempt “to distort the mentality of the Arab child and train him into submission to the cultural model of the conquering Zionist”. Whereas al-Sharq, which published the anthology, was presented as engaging in normalization and “cultural dom-ination” (Editorial Board 1986).

D. Hostility toward Israel and its culture in the Arab world resulted in a reluc-tance to publish translations from Hebrew literature into Arabic, especially if they were rendered by translators who were active in platforms identified with the Israeli establishment. In the few cases in which the press did publish such translations, the name of the translator was replaced with a fictitious one, whether from fear of being accused of normalization with Israel, or a desire to “punish” the translator for his collaboration with bodies identified with the Is-raeli establishment. Thus, for example, the story Ani vehazar (The Stranger and Me) by Hanoch Bartov was translated by Shammas and published by him in various platforms.3 However, in 1996 the translation appeared with some mi-nor editing in the Omani newspaper Omān, but the credited translator is Duā Sharīf, evidently a fictitious name. Interestingly, the journal Ariel, which is published by the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs4 republished the translation under the name of the same Duā Sharīf in 1997, and completely disregarded the existence of the actual translator, Anton Shammas (Bartov 1996/1997).

The tepid and sometimes hostile reception to his translations and Shammas’s own dissatisfaction and lack of motivation (he complained about a heavy feeling of ingratitude and self-coercion), eventually resulted in his retirement from trans-lation in the early 1980s. Reexamination of his translations led him to the conclu-sion that while they were still correct, accurate, and even good, they seemed to him like “inverted transparencies”. His explanation for this is interesting. He be-lieves that Hebrew has lost its Semitic lineage and consequently, “the overlap be-

3. For example, Biṣout muzdawaj 1974: 36–42; Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah 1984: 30–6.

4. Published in various languages since 1962, and in Arabic since 1993.


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tween the two languages [Hebrew and Arabic] is increasingly becoming an optic-al illusion. Arabic continues to maintain its linearity that flows from right to left, whereas Hebrew is increasingly exposed to sub-linguistic trends with conflicting directions. The conflict in the Middle East has penetrated the deepest strata of both languages, and the fact that Maccabi Tel Aviv’s leading [basketball] players throw balls from left to right is not only a cultural-political fact, but just as much a linguistic fact” (Shammas 1985: 19). More than attesting to Shammas’s dissatisfaction with his translations, these words reflect the process of his differentiation from Hebrew culture that started to become evident in his literary and publicistic writing in the mid 1980s, after many years of being joined at the hip to this culture.

3. “The Shallow Waters of Hebrew”

Shammas’s translations from Arabic into Hebrew

When Shammas withdrew from translating from Hebrew into Arabic, he began devoting greater attention to translating in the opposite direction, from Arabic into Hebrew. His entrance into this sphere was something of an innovation, for up to that time those active in it were mostly Jewish translators who were engaged in the study of Arabic culture and literature, such as Yosef Yoel Rivlin (1889–1971) and Menachem Kapeliuk (1901–1975), or whose origins were in Arabic culture prior to immigrating to Israel, such as Tuvia Shamoush (1914–1982) and Sami Michael (b. 1926). These translators, whose yield was relatively sparse, turned most of their efforts to translating classical Arab and Modern works from the two traditional literary centers in the Arab world, Cairo and Beirut. The few Arab translators who were engaged in translating from Hebrew into Arabic preferred to steer clear of translating in the opposite direction, from Arab-ic into Hebrew, apparently because their command of Hebrew, in their opinion as well as that of the publishers, was not sufficiently adequate to serve them as a target language. However, Shammas, who had already accumulated considerable experience in original writing in Hebrew, felt sufficiently confident in himself to make the transition between the two translational directions. Yet, it is important to examine the significance of this transition with regard to his translation policies, the nature of the translations and their purpose.

3.1. Inventory of translations

As mentioned above, Shammas began his translation career by translating from Arabic literature into Hebrew, editing the bilingual anthology Biṣout muzdawaj (In



Bilingual Voice) (1974, 1976), and translating most of the works (some 20 texts) by the Arab authors who participated in the Arab and Jewish poets and authors conferences. Most of the works selected were poetry, apparently due to the central position occupied by poetry in local Palestinian Arabic literature in those years (Abu Hanna 1994: 110–11). He devoted some of his time to adapting various works for specific target au-diences. He translated, inter alia, plays from English into Arabic and/or Hebrew, adapting them for the stage for performance before Arab or Jewish audiences. He also adapted his own play Tāqah bil-ḥayṭ (A Hole in the Wall), which he wrote in spoken Arabic, into a Hebrew version, and both versions were staged at the Haifa Municipal Theatre in 1978–1979. His Hebrew adaptation of a popular Arabic folk-tale was published as a children’s book entitled Hashaqran hakhi gadoul baolam (The Biggest Liar in the World) by the highly reputed Keter Publishing House in 1982. In this adaptation, the structure and plot of the folktale were preserved, but a humoristic tone was introduced into it.5

However, Shammas devoted most of his energies to the translation of three novels by the Palestinian author Emile Habiby (1921–1996). His translation of the novel al-Mutashāil (Haopsimist = The Pessoptomist)6 was initially published by a small, radical and marginal publishing house, Mefras, and an amended ver-sion was published in 1995 by Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House, which is one of the leading publishing houses in Israel. His translation of the second nov-el, Ikhṭayyeh (Ikhtayyeh), was published in 1988 as part of Am Oved Publishers’ prestigious Proza Acheret (Other Prose) series. His translation of the third novel, Sarāyā bint al-ghoul (Saraya bat hashed hara = Saraya, the Ogre’s Daughter), was published in 1993 in the highly regarded subscription series Hasifriya Hachadasha, which is jointly published by Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House and Siman Kriea Publishing House. The three novels are stylistically and thematically similar. All three deal with different aspects of the Palestinian tragedy, and especially with the complex reality faced by Palestinians who remained in Israel. These novels are typified by a com-bination of modernist and post-modernist literary techniques, development of a unique and personal style based on paradox, plays on words, drawing from vari-ous and contrasting sources, and mixed use of features, both old and new, classical Arabic and contemporary European, picaresque and realistic (Somekh 2003: 66). In the last years Shammas has collaborated with Andalus Publishing, a small

5. For example, compare with the folktale that appears in Ali al-Khalili 1979: 139–41. On the adaptation by Shammas, see Regev 1983: 223.

6. The full name of the novel is: al-waqāi al-gharībah fī ikhtifā Saīd abī al-naḥs al-mutashāil (The Strange Facts in the Disappearance of Sa‘id the Ill-fated Pessoptomist)


88 Mahmoud Kayyal

and marginal publishing house that has undertaken, since its establishment in 2000, to focus on translations from Arabic literature into Hebrew.7 He served as language editor of the Hebrew translation of the novel Bab al-Shams (Gate to the Sun) by the Lebanese author Elias Khoury (b. 1948), which was rendered by Moshe Hakham and published by Andalus Publishing in 2002. In his epilogue to the novel, Shammas writes:

Bab al-Shams is a treasure map of Palestine. The memory that was banished from the face of the map in 1948 now dictates the narrative on the erased parchment, and the narrative redraws the map of the lost homeland. The right of return is the right to nar-rate, and the narrative that unfolds here in the Hebrew translation gives the right-to-tell back to its owners. And the owners, who were driven off the map, from the home-land, and out of history, are returning now to realize their right to speak in the name of memory, in the very language that has expropriated their voice and erased their map (Shammas 2002).

Andalus Publishing has published at 2006 a bilingual edition of poems by Pal-estinian poet Taha Muhammad Ali (b. 1931), which were translated into Hebrew by Shammas. Ali’s poems describe, frequently with humor and irony, the experi-ences of Palestinian refugees who are banished from their land and remain faith-ful to the memory of their ruined villages. The critic Yitzhak Laor (2006) consid-ers his translation as “exciting”, and “the rare return of Anton Shammas to Hebrew literature” as “blessed act”. The above review shows that in his translations from Arabic into Hebrew Shammas focused on Palestinian authors who are Israeli citizens and/or on top-ics associated with the tragedy of the dissection and dispersal of the Palestinian people. Shammas’s epilogue to Bab al-Shams attests to the postcolonial perspec-tive he adopted in his translations, and the impression gained from it, as well as from the types of works he translated, is that he seeks by means of his translations to manifest the oppressed narrative of the Palestinian minority in the culture of the Jewish majority, and thus dig beneath the foundations of Zionist political dis-course in Israeli society.

3.2. Translation policy

Several researchers have discussed Shammas’s translation policies, especially in his translations of Emile Habiby’s works. Sasson Somekh (1993: 43–50), for ex-ample, addressed the translational solutions to Habiby’s wordplays and showed, with numerous examples, how in many cases the translator successfully compen-sates for wordplays in the source text with equivalent wordplays in the translat-

7. See the Andalus Publishing Internet website: http://www.andalus.co.il.



ed text, and how in other cases he fails to contend with them. Conversely, Reu-ven Snir indicated Shammas’s ability to “provide the reader with a polished text with no interference from Arabic linguistic and syntactic structures, in contrast with most other translations from Arabic into Hebrew”. Snir also attempted to prove that the adaptations and omission in Shammas’s translations, especially in Ikhtayyeh, are not “consistent and tendentious, and are not designed to encourage the reader to feel that the text is not alien to him or to his culture” (Snir 1993: 30). Although neither researcher points to a distinct general translation policy in Shammas’s translations, the examples they provide and their attendant expla-nations make it difficult to shake off the impression that his translation policy is typified by a tendency toward acceptability, or, in other words, adhering to the cul-tural, linguistic and stylistic norms of the target culture. Indeed, an in-depth study of his translations reveals that they are typified by non-preservation of the integ-rity of the source text in the translation, elevation of linguistic and stylistic register in the translated text, finding equivalents for wordplays and neologisms extant in the Arabic source text, and even an inclination toward adaptation and paraphras-tic translation. One of the most evident norms in Shammas’s translations is non-preservation of the integrity of the source text in the translation, namely multiple omissions and additions. These omissions expanded over time in his translations of Habiby’s works. In Haopsimist (The Pessoptimist) he omitted only a few short sentences; for example, the first verse of a poem by the Arab Jahili poet Imru al-Qais (?-540) (Habiby 1977: 48; Haopsimist 1986: 53; 1995: 41). However, some of the omissions in a later edition of the translated book stemmed from carelessness or typograph-ical errors. Thus, for example, the line describing the lion devouring the head of the Histadrut8 Labor Federation’s Arabic Department is omitted in the later edi-tion, whereas it does appear in the earlier one (Habiby 1977: 14; Haopsimist 1986: 10; 1995: 9). However, in Ikhtayyeh and Saraya the omissions are more extensive, such as the omission of a long passage from Ikhtayyeh which ridicules Oriental-ists and Arabists (Habiby 1985: 59–60; Ikhtayyeh 1988: 103). Snir (1993: 27) views these omissions as evidence of carelessness and translational difficulties, whereas Hanan Hever (1989: 186–7) views them as part of an attempt to blur the distinc-tions between source and translation. An examination of the various omissions indeed shows that they were effected for a variety of reasons, such as translation-al difficulties, a desire to avoid unwieldiness and unnecessary repetition, the de-sire to enhance readability of the text, and so on. In my view, however, most of the

8. The Histadrut was founded in 1920, initially as a Jewish labor union in Palestine (pre-state Israel), and following the establishment of the State of Israel as a body uniting various trade un-ions and workers committees, which was governed by the ruling party.


90 Mahmoud Kayyal

omissions are congruent with Shammas’s translation policy, which clearly tends toward acceptability and equivalence, rather than adequacy. Neither is it difficult to find additions in Shammas’s translations. Most of the additions explain or elaborate special features of Arabic and Islamic language and culture, such as unique terms, names, proverbs, and so on. He generally preserved the features by transliterating them into Hebrew, but added explications, inter-pretations or equivalent features from Hebrew or universal culture in the body of the translated text. For example, his additions to the following unique terms or to names of people and places:

ST: al-jāhiliyyah (Habiby 1985: 13)TT: hajahiliyyah, hatkofah hakdam islamit (The Jahiliyyah, the pre-Islamic

period (Ikhtayyeh 1988: 18).

ST: sabīl al-ṭāsāt (Habiby 1977: 30)TT: sabīl al-ṭāsāt, sheho “rahat hashtiya bekaariout hanachoshet” (Sabīl al-

ṭāsāt, a drinking utensil with copper bowls) (Haopsimist 1986: 30; 1995: 24)

ST: wādī al-qarin (Habiby 1991: 11)TT: nachal wādī al-qarin limim nachal Kziv (The stream of Wādī al-Qarin,

now called Nachal Kziv (Saraya 1993: 14)

ST: Ibn Rushd (Habiby 1977: 42)TT: Ibn Rushd, halo ho Averroes (Ibn Rushd, also known as Averroes) (Haop-

simist 1986: 45; 1995: 36).

In certain passages that have numerous omissions and additions, Shammas’s translation resembles an adaptation or paraphrastic translation. Thus, for example, in a passage in Saraya describing the attitude of the 12th century poet Usama Ibn al-Munqidh to the inhabitants of Palestine during the Crusades, the author re-peatedly names numerous Islamic sects and adds an annotation about the poet (Habiby 1991: 12). Shammas, however, elected to include parts of the author’s an-notation in the body of the text and adopts a method of generalization in order to reduce the number of references to the Islamic sects and refers to them all as

“insurgent Shiite sects”, despite the factual inaccuracy, since one of the sects men-tioned in the Arabic text (the Sufi Ḥallajian sect) is not Shiite (Saraya 1993: 14–15). Shammas’s translations are also typified by his usage of a high, biblical, florid linguistic register. Thus, we find usage of fixed collocations taken from biblical lan-guage, such as ofer ha’ayalim (young hart) and roeh bashoshanim (feedeth among the lilies) (Haopsimist 1986: 49; 1995: 38), from the Song of Songs, as well as usage



of biblical grammatical and syntactical structures, such as vayehi (let there be), trof toref (torn in pieces) (Haopsimist 1986: 10; 1995: 9) from the Book of Genesis. He always attempted to find Hebrew equivalents for the neologisms and word-plays extant in the Arabic source texts, while endeavoring not to do so at the ex-pense of the original semantic meaning. Thus, for example, Habiby’s use of a verb derived from a noun is rendered into Hebrew with relative ease: the verb mawmasahā (Habiby 1977: 92), which is an invention based on the noun mūmis (prostitute), led him to use a rarely used verb in Hebrew hiznuha (seduced into prostitution) (Haopsimist 1986: 99; 1995: 72). Habiby’s usage of wordplays based on words with the same sound or root, called jinās (homonym) in Arabic rhetoric, led Shammas to employ an equivalent play on words:

ST: fa-ād muallimī wa-itaka ḥaīth kunt mutaki-an alā al-mizwalah wa-qad zāwalanī al-qalaq (Habiby 1977: 38)

[My teacher leaned again on where I was leaned on the sundial after the wor-ry left me].

TT: vemori shav venishan el hakir shealav hayiti shaun, kir shaon hashemesh, le’achar shehade’aga shaata memeni (Haopsimist 1986: 40; 1995: 32).

In this example, Habiby’s linguistic game with the words itaka – mutaki-an, mizwalah – zāwalanī is rendered into an equivalent wordplay in Hebrew by using words whose roots are shaa and shaan (nishan, shaun, shaon and shaata).

3.3. How the Hebrew target culture received Shammas’s translations and his own attitude toward them

Shammas’s translations in general, and of the three novels by Emile Habiby (The Pessoptimist, Ikhtayyeh and Saraya) in particular, were accorded great acclaim in the Hebrew target culture. Thus, for example, Sasson Somekh views them as a “lin-guistic miracle” for “with great resourcefulness and linguistic facility, Shammas has overcome enormous translational difficulties, for Habiby’s language excels in [. . .] linguistic acrobatics, frequently exploiting the multiple meanings of words and collocations” (Somekh 2003: 67). As mentioned earlier, Shammas himself underscored the problematic nature of translating between the two languages. He even asserted that Modern Arabic poetry translated into Hebrew “does not sound good” in Hebrew. Consequently, referring to his translation of The Pessoptimist, he claimed that in his book Habiby created “a virtuoso fish that swims through the annals of the Arabic language as in a private aquarium”, but in the process of translating the book Shammas senses that this fish “does not breathe well in Hebrew [. . .] the lack of oxygen is particu-


92 Mahmoud Kayyal

larly evident in the shallow waters of spoken Hebrew” (Shammas 1985: 19). In ef-fect, Shammas alludes to the late revival and rebirth of Hebrew as a spoken lan-guage, which began slowly only toward the end of the 19th century, and did not bring about the formulation of broad, rich linguistic strata that is distinct from the literary language, as is the case with Arabic, which itself constitutes an important source for Hebrew slang (Fellman 2000). Hence, he viewed his attempts to create a Hebrew equivalent to the Arabic text in terms of linguistic strata, as a failure. However, Habiby himself was very pleased with Shammas’s translational skills, to the extent that he saw fit to appeal directly to Shammas in his novel Saraya (1991) and present him with a difficult translational challenge: “And I present An-ton Shammas with the challenge of translating these collocations and homonyms into any language, close or distant” (Habiby 1991: 151). And indeed, subsequent to Shammas’s translations, Habiby was awarded the 1992 Israel Prize for Literature. However, the commercial success and public interest in Shammas’s transla-tions of Habiby’s works provoked arguments and debates among Hebrew critics, frequently as part of the ongoing debate about Shammas’s original writing in Heb-rew. Hanan Hever, for example, views them as an attempt to blur the distinctions between the translation and the source from a desire of local Arabic literature to break through the “boundaries of the Hebrew canon. From the rejected periphery of minority Arab national culture it permeates the domain of the authoritative ma-jority culture” (Hever 1989: 186–7). In contrast, Reuven Snir asserts that “a norm of blurring the distinctions between source and translation in Palestinian Arabic literature in Israel does not exist, neither in factual statistical terms nor in the spe-cific case of Shammas’s translations of Habiby” (Snir 1993: 31). In any event, despite the favorable reception to his translations in the Hebrew target culture, Shammas’s physical and spiritual distancing from Hebrew culture, coupled with the publication of his last translations by a small and marginal pub-lishing house, seem to indicate that the mainstream of Hebrew culture pushes to the sidelines the currents and systems that challenge it and endanger its status and ideological discourse.

4. Conclusion

The translation from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa was conducted in the shadow of a prolonged conflict between Israel and the Palestinian National Move-ment and the Arab States and in the shadow of the political, economic and social hegemony of the Jewish majority over the Arab-Palestinian minority living in Is-rael. Consequently, translations between the two languages cannot be detached from the political conflict, from majority-minority relations and their attendant



ideological discourses, which the translations themselves either adopt or chal-lenge.9 The position Shammas occupies on the seam between the two cultures cre-ated dual loyalties in him and an indistinct identity, which are also manifested in the evident and significant difference between his translations from Hebrew into Arabic and his translations from Arabic into Hebrew. Shammas’s translations from Modern Hebrew literature into Arabic were mostly carried out under the aegis of bodies from the Hebrew source culture and/or identified with the Israeli establishment. The lofty objectives these bodies set for themselves with regard to these translations, such as advancing understanding and coexistence between Jews and Arabs, were apparently an attempt to justify their involvement and selective choice of the translated works. However, above all, this approach to translation reflected a hegemonic attitude on the part of the majority Jewish culture toward the minority Arab culture. Shammas, who admired Hebrew literature and even attempted to become part of it, cooperated with this policy. It is hardly surprising that his translations reveal trends that attest to his unmistak-able loyalty to the Hebrew source text: such as multiple translational borrowings, neologisms, Hebrew transliterations, selecting words in Arabic that are phonetic-ally similar to the Hebrew ones, disregard for linguistic, stylistic and ethical norms extant in the target Arab culture, and so on. These trends attest to the fact that his translations attempted to preserve and reinforce the cultural hegemony of the ma-jority and even encourage the penetration of linguistic and cultural features from the hegemonic majority culture into the dominated minority culture, thus exacer-bating its identity problem. Consequently, Shammas’s translation activity resem-bles the translational paradigm described by Jacquemond, in which the translator acts as a “servile mediator”. However, the cool and caustic reception to his transla-tions in the target culture and Shammas’s subsequent dissatisfaction attest to the opposition of the Arabic target culture to this hegemonic attitude. The attitude of the target culture reinforces Toury’s assertion regarding the prestige of the minor-ity language being elevating by reason of its belonging to a majority language in another society. But it also reminds us of Jacquemond’s description of the transla-tional paradigm in a postcolonial situation whereby the dominated culture either opposes translations from the hegemonic culture or adapts them to its needs. Shammas’s transition to translation in the opposite direction, from Modern Arabic literature into Hebrew, was not merely a technical one, but rather entailed a profound ideological change. His collaboration with bodies identified with the establishment, which typified the beginning of his literary and journalistic career,

9. Levy (2003: 111) asserts with regard to the “internal” translations in the works of Emile Ha-biby and Samir Naqqash that the translations between the two cultures involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict cannot be detached from the political conflict.


94 Mahmoud Kayyal

not only diminished considerably, but was subsequently substituted with a very critical tone toward the establishment. In his publicistic articles, as in his works, and especially in Arabesques, his standpoints and opinions increasingly chal-lenged the Zionist discourse in the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Zionist consensus with regard to the Jewish identity of the State of Israel. It is hardly surprising, then, that his translation activity was primarily intended to create an opportunity for the alternative Palestinian narrative to penetrate Israeli public awareness and some-what challenge the validity of the Zionist super-plot. This translation policy was manifested in his meticulous selection of works that represent the oppressed nar-rative of the Palestinian people, in non-preservation of the integrity of the source text in his translations, elevation of linguistic and stylistic register in the translated texts, and a tendency toward paraphrase translation, which he adopted in order to enable his translations to be accepted in the target culture. Consequently, Sham-mas’s translation activity resembles the translational paradigm described by Jac-quemond, in which the translator acts as an “authoritative mediator”, and through him the texts translated from the dominated culture adapt to the norms and de-mands of the hegemonic target culture and can be accepted by it. However, the conflict between the ideological discourse that these texts represent and the dom-inant ideological discourse in the hegemonic majority culture restricts their ma-neuvering space in the target culture and locates them in an identical position with the “minor literature”,10 which Shammas himself wrote.

Shammas’s translations

Ali, Taha Muhammad 2006. Shirim (Poems), Tel-Aviv: Andalus. 224pp. [Arabic into Hebrew]Avidan, David 1982. Idhāah min qamar iṣṭināī (Cryptograms from a Telestar), Tel-Aviv and

Acre: al-Qarn al-Thalathoun and al-Sarouji Publishing House. 72pp. [Hebrew into Arabic]Biṣout muzdawaj (In Bilingual Voice) 1974, 1976. Haifa: Bait al-Karmah / Beit Hagefen. [ Hebrew

into Arabic and vice versa]Habiby, Emile 1984, 1995. Haopsimist (The Pessoptomist) Jerusalem: Mefras. 223pp. 2nd edi-

tion: Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad. 159pp. [Arabic into Hebrew]Habiby, Emile 1988. Ikhtayyeh (Ikhtayyeh) Tel-Aviv: Am Oved. 161pp. [Arabic into Hebrew]Habiby, Emile 1993. Saraya bat hashed ha-ra (Saraya, the Ogre’s Daughter) Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz

Hameuchad. 169pp. [Arabic into Hebrew]Ka-Tzetnik (Yehiel Dinur) 1975. Kawkab al-ramād (Star of Dust), Jerusalem: Dogma. 127pp.

[Hebrew into Arabic]Rokeah, David 1977. Min ṣaīf ilā ṣaīf (From Summer to Summer), Jerusalem: al-Sharq. 62pp.

[Hebrew into Arabic]

10. “Minor literature” refers to literature that is written in a language other than the cultural source language of the author. See Deleuze & Guattari 1986: 17–19.



Ṣaiyd al-ghazālah: 12 qiṣṣah min al-adab al-ibrī al-ḥadith (The Doe Hunt: 12 Stories from Mod-ern Hebrew Literature) 1984. Tel-Aviv: Tel Aviv University, the Institute for the Transla-tion of Hebrew Literature, and al-Mashriq Publishing House. 159pp. [Hebrew into Arabic]

al-Sharq 1973. [A special issue (4: 1–3) containing translations from modern Hebrew literature into Arabic].

Yalan-Shtekelis, Miriam 1972. al-Safrah ilā jazīrat yumkin (The Journey to the Maybe Island), Jerusalem: al-Sharq. 93pp. [Hebrew into Arabic]

General bibliography

Abu Hanna, H. (1994). Riḥlat al-baḥth an al-turāth (The Travel of Searching the Heritage). Haifa: al-Wādī. 264pp. [Arabic]

Araidi, N. (1984). Nafidha alā al-adab al-ibrī al-ḥadith (A Window on the Modern Hebrew Lit-erature). Shafraam: Dār al-Mashriq. 149pp. [Arabic]

Bartov, H. (1973). Ani vehazar (The Stranger and Me). Achout rihouqah (A Far Sister). Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 80–5. [Hebrew]

Bartov, H. (1996/ 1997). Anā wal-gharīb (The Stranger and Me). translated by Duā Sharīf. Omān, 17.10.1996 / Ariel, 8, 33–8. [Arabic]

Bassnett, S. and Lefevere, A. (eds.) (1990). Translation: History and Culture. London and New York: Pinter Publishers, 1990. viii + 133pp.

Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F. (1986). Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature, Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis. xxix + 104pp.

Anon. (1986). Āid al-taṭbī (Against the Normalization). al-Mawqif al-Arabī, 67, 116. [Arabic]Evans, R. (1998). Metaphor of Translation. In: Mona Baker (ed.). Routledge Encyclopedia of

Translation Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 149–53.Fellman, Y. (2000). Tchiyat halashoun haevrit bereayah bin tchoumit (The Hebrew Language’s

Revival in Interdisciplinary View). Katedra betoldout eretz israel veyeshovah, 95, 155–8. [Hebrew]

Ghanayim, M. (1984). Naim chozir habaytah (Naim Returns Home). Iton 77, 57, 170. [Heb-rew]

Gouri, H. (1988). Yerusha (Inheritance). Cheshbon ovir (Passing Account). Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 83. [Hebrew]

Habiby, E. (1977). al-waqāi al-gharībah fī ikhtifā Saīd abī al-naḥs al-mutashāil (The Strange Facts in the Disappearance of Sa‘id the Ill-fated Pessoptomist). Jerusalem: Salāḥ al-Dīn. 208pp. [Arabic]

Habiby, E. (1985). Ikhtayyeh (Ikhtayyeh). Nicosia: Bīsān Press. 94pp. [Arabic]Habiby, E. (1991). Khurāfiyyat sarāyā bint al-ghoul (The Legend of Saraya, the Ogre’s Daughter).

Haifa: Arabisk. 184pp. [Arabic]Hever, H. (1989). Lehakout beakivo shel Achilles (Striking on Achilles’ heel). Alpayim, 1, 186–

93. [Hebrew]Jacquemond, R. (1992). Translation and Cultural Hegemony: The Case of French-Arabic Trans-

lation. In: Lawrence Venuti (ed.). Rethinking Translation: Discourse, Subjectivity, Ideology. London and New York: Routledge, 139–58.

Kaniuk, Y. (1979). Hachaim hayafim shel Clara Shiato (The beautiful life of Clara Shiato). Laila al hachof em transistor (A Night on the Beach with Transistor). Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz


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Hameuchad, 7–29. [Hebrew]al-Khalili, A. (1979). al-Baṭal al-falasṭīnī fī al-ḥikāyah al-shabiyyah (The Palestinian Protagonist

in the Folk Tale). Jerusalem: Ibn Rushd. 160pp. [Arabic]Khir, N. (1993). Liqā wa-muwājahah fī al-adab al-ibrī wal-arabī (Meeting and Confrontation

in Hebrew and Arabic Literature). Haifa: al-Karmah. 294 pp. [Arabic/ Hebrew]Laor, Y. (2006). Haadama zona hi (The Land is a Whore). Haaretz, 27.1.2006, 5b. [Hebrew]Lefevere, A. (1981). Translated Literature: Towards an Integrated Theory. Bullet Midwest MLA

(Modern Language Association), 14: 1, 68–78.Levy, L. (2003). Exchanging Words: Thematizations of Translation in Arabic Writing from Israel.

Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 23: 1&2, 106–27.Moreh, S. (1979). David Rokeah belevoush aravi (David Rokeah in Arabic Dress). Hamezrach

Hachadash, 28, 326–7. [Hebrew]Niranjana, T. (1992). Siting Translation: History, Post-Structuralism, and the Colonial Context.

Berkeley, Los Angeles, and Oxford: University of California Press. xii + 203pp.Regev, M. (1983). Kocho shel sheker (The Power of Lie). Hed hagan, 47: 2, 222–3. [Hebrew]Shammas, A. (1976). Hasefrout haaravit beisrael leachar 1967 (The Arabic Literature in Israel

after 1967). Skirout, 2, 1–7. [Hebrew]Shammas, A. (1985). Al yamin vesmoul batergom (About Right and Left in Translation). Iton

77, 64–5, 18–19. [Hebrew]Shammas, A. (2002). Al hasefer vehasofer (About the Book and the Author). In: Elias Khou-

ri. Bab al-Shams. translated by Moshe Hacham. Tel-Aviv: Andalus, back cover. [Hebrew]Snir, R. (1993). Makour vetargoum al kav hatefer (Source and Translation on the Border line).

In: Sasson Somekh (ed.). Tergoum betzidi haderech: eyounim batergoumim min hasefrout haarvit leevrit beyamino (Translation in the Road’s Sides: Studies on the Contemporary Translations of the Arabic Literature into Hebrew). Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University and the Institute for Arabic Studies, Givat Haviva, 21–39. [Hebrew]

Somekh, S. (1993). Anton Shammas: hatergoum keatgar, al tergoum yetzirout Emile Habiby laevrit (Anton Shammas: The Translation as a Challenge, On the Translation of Emile Ha-bibi’s Works into Hebrew). In: Sasson Somekh (ed.), Tergoum betzidi haderech: eyounim batergoumim min hasefrout haarvit leevrit beyamino (Translation in the Road’s Sides: Studies on the Contemporary Translations of the Arabic Literature into Hebrew). Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University and the Institute for Arabic Studies, Givat Haviva, 41–51. [Hebrew]

Somekh, S. (2003). Haopsimist vehapsimist (The Pessoptomist and the Pessimistic). Iritz achert, 16, 64–7. [Hebrew]

Toury, G. (1985). Aspects of Translating into Minority Languages from the Point of View of Translation Studies. Multilingua, 4: 1, 3–10.

Yehoshua, A. B. (1970). Mol hayarout (Against the Forests). 9 siporim (9 Stories). Tel-Aviv: Hak-ibbutz Hameuchad, 159–207. [Hebrew]

Abstract

The present paper discusses Anton Shammas’s translations of Modern Hebrew literature into Arabic and of Modern Arabic literature into Hebrew. The discussion focuses on the connection between hegemony and translation, particularly in light of the fact that these translations were carried out in the shadow of the political, social and economic hegemony of the Jewish major-



ity over the Arab-Palestinian minority in Israel. Shammas began his translation activities with a series of translations from Hebrew into Arabic, but after establishing his status in Hebrew lit-erature and journalism, he began to translate from Arabic into Hebrew as well. Evidently, this transition entailed a significant change in his translation paradigm and in his attitude toward the culture of the hegemonic majority. His translations from Hebrew into Arabic aimed to preserve and reinforce that hegemony, not only through the direct or indirect involvement of bodies from the source culture and bod-ies identified with the establishment, but also in the multiple interferences of the Hebrew source language in the Arabic target language, and his disregard for the accepted linguistic, stylistic and ethical norms of the Arab target culture. By contrast, Shammas’s translations from Arabic into Hebrew aimed to challenge the discourse of the hegemonic culture through his meticulous se-lection of works that represent the oppressed narrative of the Palestinian people and adopting translation policies to enhance acceptability in the target culture, such as non-preservation of the integrity of the source text in the translation, elevation of linguistic and stylistic register in the translated text, and an inclination toward paraphrase.

Résumé

Cet article traite des traductions de la littérature hébraïque moderne en arabe et de la littérature arabe moderne en hébreu d’Anton Shammas. La discussion porte sur le rapport entre l’hégé-monie et la traduction, en particulier à la lumière du fait que ces traductions ont été effectuées à l’ombre de l’hégémonie politique, sociale et économique de la majorité juive sur la minorité arabo-palestinienne en Israël. Shammas a commencé ses activités de traducteur par une série de traductions de l’hébreu en arabe. Mais après avoir établi son statut dans la littérature hébraïque et le journalisme, il com-mença à traduire également de l’arabe en hébreu. Évidemment, cette transition entraîna un changement significatif dans son paradigme de traduction et dans son attitude vis-à-vis de la culture de la majorité hégémonique. Ses traductions de l’hébreu en arabe visaient à préserver et à renforcer cette hégémonie, non seulement par l’implication directe ou indirecte des organismes de la culture source et des orga-nismes identifiés à l’ordre établi, mais aussi dans les multiples interférences de la langue source hébraïque dans la langue cible arabe et son mépris des normes linguistiques, stylistiques et éthiques acceptées par la culture cible arabe. En revanche, les traductions de l’arabe en hébreu de Shammas visaient à défier le discours de la culture hégémonique, par sa sélection méticu-leuse d’œuvres représentant la narration opprimée du peuple palestinien et par l’adoption de politiques de traduction visant à accroître l’acceptabilité dans la culture cible, comme la non-préservation de l’intégrité du texte source dans la traduction, l’élévation du registre linguistique et stylistique dans le texte traduit et une prédisposition à la paraphrase.

About the author

Mahmoud Kayyal is a senior lecturer in the Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies in Tel-Aviv University. He obtained his B. A. from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, his M. A. from Haifa University and his PhD from Tel Aviv University. His doctoral dissertation was about


98 Mahmoud Kayyal

the translation of Hebrew Literature into Arabic between 1948–1990. Kayyal has been teach-ing translation, modern Arabic literature and Arabic didactics in Tel-Aviv and Haifa univer-sities. Kayyal’s main research interests include translation and interpreting, intercultural con-tacts, comparative literature and modern Arabic fiction. His recent publication (2010) is entitled

“Linguistic Interference of Hebrew in the Palestinian Literature in Israel”, al-Majalla, 1 (2010), pp. 167–86. [Arabic].Address: Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Tel-Aviv University, P. O. B. 39040, Tel-Aviv 69978, Israel.Email: [email protected]

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Sendebar est une revue internationale spécialisée en traduction, terminologie et linguistique contrastive publiée par l’Université de Grenade.

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Anton Shammas’s translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa

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Transcript of Anton Shammas’s translations from Hebrew into Arabic and vice versa