No Cover Image

Journal article 770 views 122 downloads

‘Canaille, canaglia, Schweinhunderei’: Languages Personalities and Communication Failure in the Multilingual Fiction of Anthony Burgess

Julian Preece Orcid Logo

Polyphonie, Volume: 6, Issue: 1, Pages: np - np

Swansea University Author: Julian Preece Orcid Logo

Abstract

Anthony Burgess (1917-1993) drew on his knowledge of foreign languages in a range of novels throughout a literary career which spanned four decades, for most of which time he lived in non-English speaking countries, such as Malaya, Malta, Italy or Monaco. He also practised as a translator from both...

Full description

Published in: Polyphonie
ISSN: 2304-7606
Published: Polyphonie Mehrsprachigkeit_Kreativität_Schreiben 2019
Online Access: Check full text

URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa50830
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Abstract: Anthony Burgess (1917-1993) drew on his knowledge of foreign languages in a range of novels throughout a literary career which spanned four decades, for most of which time he lived in non-English speaking countries, such as Malaya, Malta, Italy or Monaco. He also practised as a translator from both French and Italian and contended that his writing in English was enriched in terms of form and style by exposure to other languages and their literatures. The article focuses on Time for a Tiger (1956), A Clockwork Orange (1962), ABBA ABBA (1977), and Earthly Powers (1980) to argue that Burgess’s interest in translation and communication between speakers of different languages was far from programmatic. It was deployed to different ends in each novel, often for comic effect but also to explore existential and social concerns and to chart an attitude to difference and other human beings, benign in Time for a Tiger, malign in A Clockwork Orange. The article posits the notion of a ‘language personality’ to account for these differences but concludes that ultimately the accent for Burgess lies on failure and that he finds different ways to depict the pit- and pratfalls in communication between speakers and writers of different languages. Anthony Burgess (1917-1993) utilizzò le sue abilità in lingua straniera in una serie di romanzi che scrisse nel corso di una carriera durata quarant'anni e trascorsa per lo più al di fuori del mondo anglofono, come in Malaya, a Malta, in Italia o a Monaco. Lavorò inoltre come traduttore sia dal francese che dall‘italiano, affermando che la sua scrittura letteraria sia stata stilisticamente e formalmente arricchita dal contatto con altre lingue e con le relative letterature. Il presente articolo approfondisce principalmente Now A Tiger (1956), A Clockwork Orange (1962), ABBA ABBA (1977) e Earthly Powers (1980) per mostrare come l’interesse di Burgess per la traduzione e la comunicazione tra parlanti di lingue diverse non fosse per nulla programmatico. Esso venne applicato in modo differente in ciascun romanzo, talvolta per creare un effetto divertente, ma anche per esplorare questioni esistenziali o sociali e per delineare un determinato atteggiamento nei confronti della differenza e degli altri, benigno in Now A Tiger, maligno in A Clockwork Orange. L'articolo sviluppa l'idea della "personalità della lingua" per spiegare tali differenze, ma conclude che per Burgess l'enfasi è sul fallimento e che egli utilizza mezzi diversi per rappresentare le trappole nella comunicazione verbale e scritta.
College: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
Issue: 1
Start Page: np
End Page: np