Translating the Orient

Download or read book Translating the Orient written by Dorothy M. Figueira and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 1991-02-12 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the emplotment of India in the Western literary imagination. Basing her discussion on the reception of an emblematic Sanskrit text, Kālidāsa's Śākuntala, Figueira studies how and why this text was distorted in translation, criticism, and adaptation, and isolates the linguistic errors and cultural distortions that can be grouped into trends and patterns. The unique situation of Śākuntala's reception affords the author the opportunity to look at the way Europeans projected their cultural needs upon India. The author puts into perspective an entire social and intellectual history of Europe's encounter with Indian culture, an examination of its cultural and political consequences, and a philosophical inquiry into differences between Eastern and Western world views.