CREATIVE TRANSLATION WORKSHOP looking at Beowulf

This is the handout from a presentation I make each year to students from MFL and Classics departments when they are embarking on a creative translation project we run at our school.

The idea is to broaden the horizons of the students with regards to the meaning of translation and to understand the freedoms (and responsibilities) of translating poetry.

The workshop
1 first asks the students to think about the different nature of different sorts of translation
2 secondly identifies what makes translating poetry different from translating other types of language
3 finally presents the students with the opening lines of Beowulf and five different versions of the poem (Tolkien, Morgan, Alexander, Heaney and Headley) - and asks them to identify the translators’ solutions to certain issues (eg first words, kennings, alliterative verse)

The objective is to make students feel free when they try translating poetry themselves.

This is a perfect starting point if you are running a Creative Translation project in your school - suitable for sixth formers.

Students then go on to undertake different translation challenges in their subject groups (MFL and classics) or using home languages.