Translating "Foreignness"

This text was very interesting for me. Just last week, I argued literary translations should be kept "faithful" to its source material in part because many people look toward foreign literature to hear a unique perspective or style of writing. However, I can't say I agree with most of Bellos' comments in this particular reading. 

While I agree maintaining foreign aspects of a text is important, I believe this concept is more about maintaining the ideas, themes, cultural differences, or styles that are present in foreign literature. Bellos mentioned a lot about preserving the way a language sounds through translation, including preserving expressions unique to the original language. For instance, having a character exclaim "Mon dieu!" rather than "Oh my God!" is more natural and true to the original, as the actual meaning of such expressions can't be exactly translated. This makes no sense to me and is quite strange. If a character is speaking English for an entire book, why randomly make that character speak another language just to remind the reader that the text was originally written in that language? I also think doing something like this can separate the reader from the text. It would certainly lose my immersion. When people look for foreign media, they aren't interested in feeling a stark separation. They want to understand different ideas and cultures and connect it to their own lives in some way. 

Overall, I think a translation should aim to maintain and convey the feeling of the original. If in the source text, a character is (in the context of the story) abnormally strict about cultural norms, then perhaps it is okay to maintain those aspects of foreignness. However, if the purpose of a character is to not meant to be conspicuous in that regard, their essence should be preserved. 

Kenna Ward