Artur Sandauer’s Translation of the Bible as a Medium of Literary Conversion to Modern Marranism Cover Image

Czy jest możliwy marański tekst konwersyjny? Biblia według Artura Sandauera
Artur Sandauer’s Translation of the Bible as a Medium of Literary Conversion to Modern Marranism

Author(s): Karina Jarzyńska
Subject(s): Biblical studies, Translation Studies, Theory of Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego
Keywords: translation studies; Bible in Polish culture; Artur Sandauer; modern Marranism; conversion texts;

Summary/Abstract: The article considers Bible translation as a potentially converting experience for the translator and for the readers. It is a case study of the work of an important Polish literary critic, Artur Sandauer, who in 1977 translated the Book of Genesis and published it with an extensive commentary, becoming a part of a “biblical boom” that happened in Poland from 1965 to 1985 (as a result of the Second Vatican Council). Numerous translations of the Bible were initiated at that time by both religious institutions and lay individuals of various backgrounds. Sandauer, a Holocaust survivor, was one of the last such translators and his attitude towards existing denominations was particularly complicated. The article identifies textual strategies that he uses to challenge the sanctity of the Bible, aiming for spiritual independence of himself and the potential reader. This type of postsecular, literature-oriented biblical translation has the hallmarks of a conversion text, although the change that would be made in the translator and the reader is unstable, and, as such, akin to the status of a modern marrano.

  • Issue Year: 2021
  • Issue No: 48
  • Page Range: 115-137
  • Page Count: 23
  • Language: Polish