An Irish diasporic translator: Louise Swanton Belloc and the diffusion of Irish writing in nineteenth-century France

Abstract

Translation rarely features in modern Irish diaspora studies, which have sometimes been accused of an Anglocentric monolingual bias. This article explores possibilities for a renewed attention to Irish diasporic translators in the modern period by recovering the neglected figure of Louise Swanton Belloc (1796-1881), the daughter of an officer in the Irish Brigades in France. Besides producing French versions of English classics, Swanton Belloc did much to disseminate Irish writing and promote Irish causes in 19th-century France. An examination of several translations and of their paratextual apparatus charts Swanton's evolution as a diasporic translator, from an early translation that was categorised as English literature by her French publisher to an increasing assertion of the Irish dimension of the translated material -sometimes bringing out Irish features that were only latent in the original. The discussion of Swanton Belloc's choices and strategies as a translator of and commentator on Irish writing is complemented by references to personal archival material that survives. Finally, the Franco-Irish translator's twofold affiliation to Irish causes and to the English language underscores the paradoxes of mediators whose bilingualism provides an interface between more than two national cultures. Her case suggests that diasporic translation can both find inspiration in and unsettle notions of origins, Irish or other.