Woyzeck

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Process

Translation

What exactly is the storyworld of Woyzeck? As any translator of Woyzeck knows, this is a maddening and ultimately unanswerable question. We can never know exactly what Büchner intended with Woyzeck, as he left the piece an unfinished fragment and took such secrets to the grave. Scholarly debate rages on to this day concerning the validity of various fragmentary manuscripts, copies, and translations. This production is not concerned with these issues, important as they may be. I have made no attempt to create the definitive version of Woyzeck. My approach to translation is well expressed by Octavio Paz in his essay "Translation: Literature and Letters." Paz describes the relationship of the translation to the original as parts of a grand "symphony" of literary interrelationships. Paz writes: And each version is an original and distinct poem. True, the synchronization is not perfect, but if we take a step backward, we can understand that we are hearing a concert, and that the musicians, playing different instruments, following neither conductor nor score, are in the process of collectively composing a symphony in which improvisation is indistinguishable from imitation. (160-161) This script of Woyzeck is an adaptation, a posthumous collaboration of sorts between Büchner and myself. Many things have been changed or left out altogether, but none of this was done without deliberation and reason. My process was first to create a direct German to English translation and then an original adaptation. Over the course of my first semester as an MA student I completed an original direct translation from German to English of Büchner's entire text. I used a copy of Büchner's original German Woyzeck script available through Project Gutenberg at Gutenberg.org. Because Woyzeck is now in the public domain and free of copyright, I was able to translate and adapt it without obtaining permissions or paying for rights to do so. I was also able to claim copyright for myself on both my direct translation and adaptation.