3 Questions with Will Pewitt
Will Pewitt (he/him) teaches at the University of North Florida, where he offers courses in global literatures and interdisciplinary courses that work with Jacksonville's local refugee populations. He has had work most recently appearing in The Oxford Anthology of Translation, Arab Lit Quarterly, and North American Review, is currently on staff with The Adroit Journal, and is working on a book featuring his original translations of Classical Arabic poetry by Andalusian women. More of his work can be found at WPewitt.com.
Former Associate Editor Carlos Novoa talks with Will Pewitt about their work from Issue 75, out now!!
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You mention in your translator’s note that in translating Al-Buḥturī’s verse, you were aiming for a “communicative interpretation” rather than a literal rendering or a modern paraphrasing. Can you describe a bit more of what you mean by “communicative interpretation” and what that process is like?
This term—akin to dynamic equivalence—is one I came across in the work of Dr. Wessam Elmeligi, who describes it as a method between literal translation (where preference is given to strict dictionary definitions from the source text) and free interpretation (where preference is given to the idioms or even values of the target text). When I’m translating something like Al-Buḥturī’s here, my goal is to avoid falling too far to either pole—mainly by attempting to inhabit the poem's emotional, contextual, and tonal core while searching for the English that enables its sharp juxtapositions, restraint, and ache to be appreciated by the audience.
Literal translation, though it can be virtuous in its fidelity, can risk calcifying the language—what emerges can feel rigid, encased in glass at best or, at worst, blandly dusty. On the other hand, being too free to carry the language over can strip the poem of the texture that ties it to its origin, rendering it too diffuse or unmoored from its history. Obviously, this spectrum leads to constant judgment calls during creation, but when revising a translation, this is the standard I try to keep in mind to guide the process; in practice, this means focusing on the sensory underpinnings, asking what it feels like to be “aflame,” and trying out options to evoke the consumption by grief yet still fragilely existent before arriving at “slain from all but light.” In short, the aim is to retain the poem’s architecture but without asking the reader to cross too many bridges to be overcome by it.
When approaching translating a work like Al-Buḥturī’s “Signal Fire,” which is at once timeless in its dealings with universal emotions such as grief but also incredibly steeped in its own cultural tradition. How do you weigh the desire to be faithful to the original text against the considerations being made for the work existing in a new context and for a new audience?
I feel that a translator’s task is to be something of a guide, a liaison between here and there (or now and then). The Arabic word ترجمُن (tarjumān), typically cited as “translation,” can just as well be rendered as “discloser,” “guide,” or “one that opens.” I work in (and love!) many other literary forms, but in translation, other people—not just the target audience but also the source’s writer and culture—can never stray too far from consciousness. This I try to own rather than forget; rather than focus on whatever may or may not be timeless, per se, I try to keep cognizant of whether I’m keeping all those other people properly in mind, whether I’m bringing them all along into this poetic experience. Sometimes, this is very technical, focusing on a poem’s gestures rather than adhering to granular syntax or trying to find echoes of an Abbasid-era idiom in 21st-century English, etc. Most often, though, this is simply about sustaining the wonder that made me want to speak with the poem in the first place.
Faithfulness, as the question puts it, is a great way to frame it, I think. When we are faithful to a spouse, to friends, to our child, we do not mean doggedly mirroring their every literal move; we mean recognizing them as a cause of our respect, admiration, and hope; we mean allowing them to take root as a foundational center of gravity in our own actions; we mean trying to do right by them. Just as there are ways to be faithful to multiple people in distinct ways, I think of the pluralistic fidelity one has to the people on all sides of the translation process. So, it’s less a balancing of weighing opposite interests than it is a creative process to find what enables the participation of all involved.
Is there anything you’d like to share about your translation of this poem that we don’t know?
One of my favorite notes about Arabic poetry is that the term for a poetic line— بيت (bayt)—is also the word for “home” or “encampment.” In this way, an Arabic poem often doesn’t necessarily have a defined linear progression or some final point; like a village, it’s an assortment of homes—each one contributing to the atmosphere and meaning of the whole. In other words, it’s not necessarily teleological but relational.
This poem of Al-Buḥturī’s is a clear demonstration of that effect: each line distinctive in its focus and interests but cumulatively covering much more ground than if any one line were treated as definitive of the poem’s central identity. The lines of the poem are undeniably interconnected, mutually bound; they are each, though, speaking for themselves. When I’m asked about translation, this is a facet of carrying over Arabic tradition that is easy to overlook but, I think, crucial in rendering a just translation: no line can be merely transitional or supportive—just as each home is defined by its occupants, each line has to bring its own distinguishing feature. All are part of the communal whole, yes, but also are all full with their own voices.