The works that are never retranslated are those we only care to read once. What impels us toward new versions is not the weakness of existing translations, but the strength and richness of certain works of literature. It is precisely the mark of a great work of art that it demands to be retranslated. The most common question I was faced while working on this new Tin Drum was, “What was wrong with the old one?” This question reveals a fundamental misunderstanding about the nature of literary translation.

Not that the initial translations were always bad, but the book is a bit racy (and difficult), and a number of the original translations omitted lines, paragraphs, etc., or just didn’t quite capture the nuances of Grass’s unique style.īreon Mitchell puts it best in his afterword to the new translation:

To celebrate the 50th Anniversary of The Tin Drum, the novel-which, to continue the trend started above, is arguably Grass’s greatest achievement-the novel is being published in new translations around the world.

(This event is part of the 2009 Helen and Kurt Wolff Translation Symposium, the subject of which is “Interpretive Perspective and Translation.” The symposium is only open to translators, scholars, and the like, although German lit/translation enthusiasts are encouraged to contact Lisa Lux lux at chicago dot goethe dot org for more information.) And Grass, having received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1999, is arguably Germany’s most important post-War German writer. Oskar, on the run, discovers sex, jazz and the black market.Over the past couple weeks, I’ve been gorging myself on Gunter Grass novels in preparation for the panel I’m moderating tomorrow with Krishna Winston ( Crabwalk), Breon Mitchell ( The Tin Drum), and Michael Henry Heim ( My Century, Peeling the Onion)-arguably three of the best German-English translators working today. Sun 9th Jun 1996, 14:30 on BBC Radio 4 FMĪbridged in two parts by Mike Walker. Three-year-old Oskar decides to stop growing and stop talking. Haunted by the deaths of his parents and wielding his tin drum Oskar recounts the events of his extraordinary life from the long nightmare of the Nazi era to his anarchic adventures in post-war Germany. On his third birthday Oskar decides to stop growing. With Phil Daniels as Oskar and Kenneth Cranham as Matzerath.

The Tin Drum by Günter Grass