English translations of Daniel Owen 1888-2010 :

: nation, canon and Welsh-English cultural relations

Abstract

In this thesis, I analyse four English translations of the novels of Victorian Welsh
-language novelist Daniel Owen from a variety of postcolonial and Translation Studies perspectives. Drawing on recent theories in Translations Studies and Welsh cultural studies, I suggest that translations of Owen’s work have been undertaken as part of a variety of political and cultural agendas. These often interrelated agendas have included attempts to reinvent the idea of the Welsh nation, attempts to reinforce and/or rehabilitate the reputation of Daniel Owen as a canonical author in the Welsh-language literary canon, and attempts to either inspire the tradition of Welsh Writing in English, or to distance that practice from Welsh-English translation. In presenting these arguments, I suggest that the role of Welsh-English translation in Welsh cultural history
over the late nineteenth to twenty-first centuries has been underappreciated, and that it has in fact been central to processes of cultural and national re-
imagination in Wales over this period.

Date of Award	Jan 2015
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Bangor University
Supervisor	Helena Miguelez-Carballeira (Supervisor)