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In Translation Multiples, Kasia Szymanska examines what happens when translators, poets, and artists expose the act of translation by placing parallel translation variants next to one another in a standalone work of art, presenting each as a legitimate version of the original. Analyzing such 鈥渢ranslation multiples鈥� as a new genre of writing, Szymanska explores how an original text can diverge into variants, how such multiplicity can be displayed and embraced, and how the resulting work can still be read as a coherent text. To do so, she focuses on contemporary projects in two different contexts鈥擜nglophone experimental practices and post鈥�1989 Poland鈥檚 emergence into democracy鈥攚hile viewing them against the backdrop of twentieth-century cultural and political developments.

Szymanska first takes a broad look at Anglophone global culture, debunking the myth of translation as a transparent medium and an unoriginal, secondary form of writing. She then turns to postcommunist Poland, where projects introducing multiple translation variants with different ideological readings offered an essential platform for pluralist political discussion. She examines in particular an elaborate metatranslation of 鈥淟a Marseillaise鈥�; a triple rendering of Anthony Burgess鈥檚 novel A Clockwork Orange; and a quadruple book of Bertolt Brecht鈥檚 poetry with distinct readings by four translators. She argues that the creators of such multiples want to tell their own stories鈥攑ersonal, critical, visual, or political. Showing why multiple translations matter, Szymanska calls for a redefined practice of reading translations that follows the ethics of the multiple.