HHU, room 23.21.02.22
In this lecture, Miaïna Razakamanantsoa discusses the different stakes at play when exoticism is mobilized in the publishing of translated literature. Considering the different shapes exoticism may take in the packaging of literary translations, Razakamanantsoa explores the different factors, actors, and practices inherent to book publishing that are involved in this process. Particularly focusing on the legal structures of the book industry, Razakamanantsoa explores how the use of exoticism is delineated by IP laws (e.g., copyright), eventually influencing the global branding of translated literature.
To illustrate this, Razakamanantsoa considers Saygin Ersin’s novel Pir-i lezzet! (2016) and examines the different book covers created for the original and translated editions of Ersin’s work. She discusses how some editions of the work, like the US edition (2018), influenced the marketing strategy of other foreign publishers—an influence that was yet strongly regulated by copyright conventions, prompting publishers to reproduce the US design without copying it, i.e., by slightly modifying it. Particularly focusing on the tropes of exoticism created and reproduced on the different covers of the novel, this case study provides deeper insight into how visual paratexts (e.g., cover designs) circulate and evolve from one publisher to another.
At the crossroads between Book Studies, Translation Studies, and Postcolonial Studies, this lecture discusses how the legal structures and social dynamics of today’s book industries influence the way literary texts are culturally translated to local audiences. Considering concepts like indirect translation, the world system of translations, and copyright conventions, it is an invitation to further reflect on the power hierarchies in the global circulation of literature.
Miaïna Razakamanantsoa is a research associate and doctoral candidate at the University of Münster. She first received a bachelor’s degree in Multilingual Communication (French-English-Spanish) at the University of Geneva before completing a master’s degree in Advanced Anglophone Studies at the Leibniz University Hannover. She worked as a research associate at the CRC 1385 “Recht und Literatur” of the University of Münster from 2021 to 2023, before starting her current position at the Chair of Book Studies of the University of Münster in 2023. Her research interests include book publishing, paratexts, translations, and the global circulation of literature.
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