Abstract:

Abstract Translation, in the work of writer Herberto Helder, performs a winding rewriting aimed at reenacting the voices of poets who, in different times and cultures, shared elements of a specific poetic knowledge. In the present study, I consider the hypothesis that the ways explored by the Portuguese poet to set up a dialogue with other texts are not restricted to the realm of a national memory nor to any sort of Portuguese mythic-imperialistic imaginary. As a translator, Helder keeps his attention on the Amerindian poetry – from the Aztec, Quechua, Yuma, Sioux, Omaha, Navajo, and Rocky Mountain peoples – as well as on the Eskimo, Tartar, Japanese, Indonesian, Arabic-Andalusian and Mexican Nahuatl poetic traditions. His translation practice seems to refuse the notion of literature as a discourse historically delimited in time and space, once he ignores a considerable part of European civilization modern poetry, and does not choose poets and poems for their belonging to a utopic only Portuguese language, rather preferring voices that heterodoxically mix raving and lucidity. Author Biography Sabrina Sedlmayer, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais Formação em Psicologia, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Mestrado em Literatura Brasileira, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Doutorado em Literatura Comparada, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Pós-Doutorado em Teoria da Literatura, Universidade Estadual de Campinas. Professora Adjunta da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil. E-mail: [email protected]

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