Fragmented Translation: Case Study of Max Weber's Reception in Poland

Fragmented Translation: Case Study of Max Weber’s Reception in Poland

Fragmented translation is what happens when there the unity of the original is not preserved in the work of the translator. In fragmented translation, a body of ideas is misinterpreted as just a text. A text, unlike a body of ideas, can be cut into pieces, abridged, but most importantly it can be read as though it was never in the company of other texts.  

I want to discuss the conditions and effects of fragmented translation on the reception of classics. I know the translator’s work of my own experience: I have translated Max Weber, Norbert Elias, Charles Wright Mills, Mary Douglas and many others. In this talk, I will use the case of Max Weber.

Terminological, conceptual and stylistic decisions of the translator working on a text are circulated and create an illusion of completeness, even if the text itself is just a fragment. Such was the case with Weber’s Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft and Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie in Poland. Incidentally, this made original works look uneconomically verbose, once they finally appeared in Polish several years ago. Another case is Die protestantische Ethik itself: it is currently available in three different Polish translations, only one of which is full. Differences between them show that translator’s decisions largely go uncontested as far as meaning is concerned. Double responsibility for meaning and for readability is universally accepted, but it is rarely mentioned that meaning is seldom controllable beyond a circle of most fastidious readers. Finally, where some parts are chosen, some are omitted and sometimes hardly read at all. This was the case of Weber’s Rechtssoziologie.

Fragmented translation creates an area of shadow in which the body of ideas is lost, leaving behind just a loose collection of texts.