RVPs Literary Criticism in Translation RI 2016 (original) (raw)

Ramnarayan V. Pathak, apart from his creative effulgence, also emerges as one notable reflective critical mind of the 19 th century. His writings bear historical and critical significance in the contexts of Gujarati as well as pan Indian language literatures. His prodigious volume of work pertains to varied domains such as creative writing, literary criticism, literary history, translation, prosody, epistemology, and aesthetics among others. This variety of subjects and his ingenious critical acumen not only invite translational deliberations for Pathak's precious little appearance in Indian English academia, but they also pose questions of nature of and methods for translation. Pathak's creative and critical orientation cause strategic deviation in his register, tenor, content and execution in sync with nature of his discourse (historical, formalistic study, philosophical, social, political, aesthetic etc.), form of discourse (critical essay, review, radio talk, keynote address to seminars, etc), audience (informed audience, general readers, students, academics, etc.), subject matter (study of poetic meters, Indian Darshana theories of knowledge, practical criticism of writers like Narmad, Tagore among others). Translating Pathak's writings in English amounts to revaluing, interpreting, adapting and deploying popularly discussed and practiced translation theories in indigenous discoursal context. This paper intends to study translatorial perspectives on critical writings of RV Pathak in terms of theory and practice.