Jelena Kostić-Tomović, rad posvećen Brehtovoj drami "Sofoklova Antigona" i problemima pri njenom prevođenju na srpski jezik, Filološki fakultet u Beogradu, međunarodna konferencija, maj 2014. godine

1. Humanism and/or reckless rulers:
Brecht’s adaptation of Sophocles’ Antigone
and translation problems
Prof. Jelena Kostić-Tomović
International scientific conference Humanism: Culture or Illusion?
University of Belgrade, Faculty of Philology
Belgrade, 15th – 16th May 2014
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2. The presentation
 Sophocles’ Antigone and its translations
and adaptations: “There is nothing worse
than disobedience to authority.”
 Hölderlin’s translation of Antigone and its
reception: “the work of a madman” or of a
genius?
 Brecht’s adaptation of the Antigone (e.g. of
Hölderlin’s translation): returning home after
exile
 Translating Brecht’s Antigone: an
insurmountable challenge?
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3. I
SOPHOCLES’ ANTIGONE –
TRANSLATIONS AND ADAPTIONS
Sophocles
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4. Sophocles’ Antigone
 Sophocles (497/6 – 406/5 B.C.)
 Wrote 123 plays
 7 have survived in a complete form, among
them Antigone
 Antigone - one of the Theban plays,
together with Oedipus the King and
Oedipus at Colonus
 First performance on stage 442 B.C. in
Athens – a great success
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5. Sophocles’ Antigone
 Mythological plot (Oedipus’s curse etc.); main
characters: Antigone, Creon, Ismene;
 The focus – not on the historical and political
events of the time; the play does point at the
dangers of absolute power (tyranny).
 Creon: “There is nothing worse than
disobedience to authority.”
 Timeless relevance:
state control –
civil disobedience / civil courage;
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6. Sophocles’ Antigone –
German Translations and Performances
 More than 100 different translations into
German (90 between 1760 and 1920);
 First published translation: 1636 by Martin
Opitz, a Baroque poet;
 First performance on stage: 1808 at the
Weimar Court Theatre (translation by F.
Rochlitz);
 First significant performance on stage: 1841
(artistic director Ludwig Tieck, translation by
J.C. Donner, music Felix Mendelssohn-
Bartholdy);
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7. Sophocles’ Antigone – Serbian
Translations
 1873 Panajot Papakostopulos (1820-1879), a
medical doctor;
 1922 Miloš N. Đurić (1892-1967), expert in
ancient Greek literature, philosophy, ethics etc.
 Croatian: Branimir Žganjer (1919-1999)
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8. Sophocles’ Antigone -
Adaptations
Numerous adaptations
in various languages and forms
 1664 Jean Racine
 1917 Walter Hasenclever
 1942 by Jean Anouilh
 1947 by Bertot Brecht
 1949 Carl Orff (opera)
 1963 Rolf Hochhuth (short story)
 1996 Mikis Theodorakis (opera) etc.
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9. II
ANTIGONE TRANSLATION
BY FRIEDRICH HÖLDERLIN
Hölderlin
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10. Friedrich Hölderin
 German romantic poet, 1770-1843;
 Important contribution to the development of
German Idealism, early influence on Hegel and
Schelling;
 Great admirer of ancient Greek culture and
supporter of the French Revolution;
 Important works: epistolary novel Hyperion,
tragedy Empedocles, poems;
 1805 falling into schizophrenia
 Little known during his lifetime and largely
unknown for the rest of the 19th century;
 Rediscovered in 1913 by Norbert von Hellingrath,
who brought out an edition of Hölderlin’s works;
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11. Sophocles’ Antigone –
Hölderlins Translation into German
 1804 “Die Trauerspiele des Sophokles”:
Antigone and Oedipus the King
negative reactions
 first performance on stage only in1918 in
Zurich
 1923 a staging in Darmstadt, 1940 a staging in
the Burg Theatre in Vienna
 1947 Brecht’s adaptation, premiere 1948 in
Chur (Switzerland)
 1949 opera by Carl Orff
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12. The uniqueness
of Hölderlin’s translations
Return to natural
language and its powers
attempt to renovate
the language
out of its
etymological origins:
giving the words back their
primary meaning,
or at least their ancient
meaning;
I
“Graecization”
of German:
Was ist's, du scheinst ein rotes
Wort zu färben
II
Archaisation
Arbeit instead of Mühsal
Frau instead of Herrin
Tugend (← taugen) –
instead of Wert
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13. Antoine Berman (1942-1991):
“Hölderlin’s translations are part and
parcel of his poetic trajectory, of his
concept of language, poetry, and that
which he himself calls the ‘experience
of the foreign’ – to such extent that the
customary categories of poetry and
translation can only be applied with
difficulty in his case.”
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14. Negative reception
Contemporaries
F. Schiller: “the work of a madman”
Modern day critics
W. Benjamin sees a connection between the
radicality of Hölderlin’s translations
and his break-down.
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15. Walter Benjamin
“Hölderlin’s translations in particular are
subjects to the enormous danger inherent in
all translations: the gates of language thus
expended and modified may slam shut and
endorse the translator with silence; … in them
meaning plunges from abyss to abyss until it
threatens to become lost in the bottomless
depths of language.”
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16. Positive reception
Contemporaries
Bettina von Arnim and Clemens Brentano
Modern day critics
rediscovery → first complete edition →
reevaluation →status of historic translations
“[Hölderlin’s translations] have been recognized
as epoch-making in the history of not only
German but Western translation.”
(A. Berman)
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17. III
ADAPTION
BY BERTOLT BRECHT
Bertolt Brecht
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18. Brecht’s Antigone – key data 1
 Written between 30 Nov and 12 Dec1947;
 Premiere on15 Feb 1948 in Chur, Switzerland
(small provincial theatre);
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19. Brecht’s Antigone – key data 1I
 German premier 18 Nov 1951 in Greiz (GDR),
director Otto Ernst Tickardt;
 Published in 1949 in Germany as
“Antigonemodell 1948” (with photos and
sketches by C. Neher);
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20. Why Hölderin?
According to Brecht:
 Recommended to Brecht by Caspar Neher;
 Sentimental reasons - returning to the German
language area:
Vermutlich ist es die Rückkehr in den deutschen
Sprachbereich, was mich in das Unternehmen
treibt.
◦ Traces of the Swabian dialect (schwäbische Tonfälle)
◦ Reminiscence of grammar school Latin (gymnasiale
Lateinkonstruktionen)
◦ Associations with Hegel, Luther etc.
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21. Why Hölderin?
Compatibility with the goals of the epic
theatre – the audience has always to be aware
that it is watching a play
Contributing to the Verfremdungseffect
(“making strange” effect) – detaching the
audience from the action of the play and the
characters (avoiding empathy → non-
Aristotelian drama)
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22. Hölderlin’s Antigone vs.
Brecht’s Antigone
 About 20% taken from Sophocles/Hölderlin without
alterations, about 30% altered to a certain extent,
about 50% added;
Accentuating the relevance to the current situation:
 A new prologue in Berlin 1945 – two sisters are
afraid to take the body of their brother, a deserted
soldier, off the gallows.
 Polynices is not a traitor, but a deserter.
 Thebes is losing instead of winning the war.
 The defeat is unavoidable, but Creon wants the
hole city to go down with him.
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23. Reception
Not really a success:
 3 performances in Chur and 1 guest
performance in Zurich;
 Was staged by other German directors only a
few times in the decades to come: 1951 Greiz,
1952 Eisenach, 1959 Gera and 1976 Dresden;
 “Antigonemodell 1948”: only a couple of
hundred copies during the first years;
 A radio play (Deutschlandsender,1970): not a
success;
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24. Historical significance - a decisive
point
in Brecht’s professional life
 Brecht’s first play after WW II;
 Brecht’s first production in an German-speaking
country after WW II;
 First collaboration after WW II with the stage
and costume designer Caspar Neher, a close
associate and a childhood friend;
 Helene Weigel’s first performance on stage
after 15 years in exile (at the age of 47);
 A test for a future production of Mother
Courage with Weigel and Neher in Germany;
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25. Theatrical significance
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26. Antigone in the context
of Brecht’s late work
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• Brecht wrote only a few plays after WW II:
Brecht’ plays after WW II
Adaptation Sophokles – Antigone 1947
Die Tage der Commune 1949
Adaptation Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz – Der Hofmeister 1949
Adaptation Gerhart Hauptmann – Biberpelz und roter Hahn 1950
Adaptation William Shakespeare – Coriolanus 1951–1955
Adaptation Anna Seghers – Der Prozess der Jeanne d’Arc 1952
Turandot oder Der Kongreß der Weißwäscher 1953
Adaptation Molière – Don Juan 1952
Pauken und Trompeten (nach George Farquhar) 1954
• Mainly directing his own plays after WW II;
• 11 Jan 1949 “Mother Courage” with H. Weigel and Erich Engel,
Deutsches Theater in East Berlin – a great success;
• Since autumn 1949 his own theater company, the famous
Berliner Ensemble

27. IV
TRANSLATING
BRECHT’S ADAPTATION
Danica Ristovski as Brecht’s Antigone 2006
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28. Complexity of the constellation
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Brecht’s Adaption
Only 2/3
Serbian translations
No reception of
Hölderlin’s
translation in Serbia
Only a week
awareness of the
German and
international reception
of Hölderlin’s
translation
No
equivalents to
many
distinctive
features of the
original, e.g.
the Swabian
dialect

29. Translating Brecht’s Antigone –
an insurmountable challenge?
Compromises are inevitable.
Sacrifice some to save some.
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30. Guidelines for translation
Purpose of translation
 Performance on stage
→ highest priority: comprehensibility
→ suitable for articulating on stage (actors)
→ suitable for following the play (audience)
→ no footnotes, prefaces, comments etc.
 Publishing (printing)
→ comprehensibility not necessarily the priority
→ possible footnotes, preface, afterword, comments
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The
translation
by Miloš
Đurić offers
a good
basis for
theater
translation.

31. References
 Berman, A. (1992). The Experience of the Foreign. Culture
and Translation in Romantic Germany. Translatet by S.
Heywaert. New York: State University of New York Press.
 Berman, A. (2004). Prevođenje i slovo ili konačište za
dalekog. Prevela Aleksandra Mančić. Beograd: Rad.
 Hecht, W. (1988). Brechts Antigone des Sophokles. Frankfurt:
Suhrkamp.
 Sophokles Antigone. Übersetzt von Hölderlin. Bearbeitet von
Martin Walser. Frankfurt: Insel Verlag.
 Klaniczay, G., Werner, M. & Gecser, O. (eds.). Multiple
Antiquities – Multiple Modernities. Ancient Histories in 19.
Century European Cultures. Frankfurt: Campus.
 Sophokles (1981). Antigone. Greichisch/Deutsch. Übersetzt
von Norbert Zink. Stuttgart: Reclam.
 Sofokle (2005). Antigona. Car Edip. Preveo Miloš N. Đurić.
Zemun: JRJ.
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32. Thank you
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