Promoting a More Republican Way of Life: The translator Juan G. de Luaces under the Franco dictatorship

Abstract

This paper highlights the fact that translators are not only relevant figures in cultural terms but they are also political agents when they produce their translations, more specifically, when they are subjected to totalitarian regimes that exercise censorship over cultural manifestations. The translation the author addresses here is Intemperie (1945), based on the novel The Weather in the Streets by Rosamond Lehmann (1936). It was produced by Jean G[onzález] de Luaces, who opposed the newly established regime. In order to fully appreciate the translator’s political work, it needs to be contextualized in the historical period in which it was published: the Franco dictatorship (1939-1975). Despite the existence of a bureaucratic apparatus that submitted all materials to censorship before publication, the Francoist censorship machine was incoherent and fractured, thus, allowing anti-Francoist texts for publication. Luaces’ translation into Spanish of The Weather in the Streets reflects his political and social engagement. Bearing in mind Maria Tymozcko’s reflections on activist translation, she provides an analysis of Intemperie in order to show that translators may “use translation for particular ideological and activist goals” (2007: 189).