First page of the treatease “About the different methods of translation” by Friedrich Schleiermacher, 1816, as displayed in the German Romanticism Museum, Frankfurt am Main

Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834) said about translation: “Either the translator leaves the author in peace as much as possible and moves the reader towards the author; or he leaves the reader in peace as much as possible and moves the author towards the reader.” (transl. The German Romanticism Museum.)

Debate on Translation Methods

All translation students – including me when I was changing careers some years ago – learn about this general problem involved with translation:

Should the translated text reflect the characteristics of the foreign language or rather read like a text written in the native language?

More than 200 years ago, Friedrich Schleiermacher started a debate on possible translation methods. Schleiermacher himself concluded the first method would do best (while most of today’s translators disagree).

I was not really impressed about the debate when I learned about it early in my translation studies.

But I was the more surprised to find the original text displayed in the German Romanticism Museum, Frankfurt am Main.

I never thought I would be able to look the author of the debate in the eye “posthumously”.

Journey into Romanticism – Schleiermacher’s Text

Suddenly, pure theory had a face, a context, a purpose. I could literally see this fundamental idea about translation evolve.

During that time, the Romanticism, poets and scholars translated important foreign literature for the first time, discussing possible approaches. And Schleiermacher, a philosopher, talked about the “different methods of translation” in a speech before the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences in 1813. The book providing the text was from 1816.

The complete text can be read on the internet in a free copy provided by the University of Michigan.

What an effect from such a little book.