Lauro Maia Amorim

Translation, Blackness, and the (In)visible: Harryette Mullen's Poetry in Brazilian Portuguese Lauro Maia Amorim

How blackness translates into different geographical contexts is an interesting question that only recently has started to attract scholarly attention in English. This book is a reflection on the connections between blackness/black poetry, and the notion of (in)visibility and translation, with a focus on the work Muse & Drudge (republished in Recyclopedia, 2006), written by the African-American female poet Harryette Mullen. What are the implications of translating contemporary black poetry, with its particular modes of questioning identity, into the Brazilian context, in which there are other underlying assumptions about blackness and black poetry, conceived according to contextually different needs? This question is addressed in light of Amorim's own translations of Mullen's work. The book approaches non-mapped questions about the frontiers of black poetry as a translated literature, which make possible riveting developments regarding the relations between translation, blackness and the formation of identity. The analysis should be especially useful to readers interested in Translation Studies, Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies with special focus on the Black Diaspora.