Palimpsests of Translation: On Antígona Furiosa in Greek

Handwritten notes by an unknown author on Gambaro’s text in Spanish.

In Griselda Gambaro’s Antígona Furiosa (1986), the heroine comes back from the dead. Written in the aftermath of the dictatorship in Argentina, Gambaro’s play refers to the reality of forced disappearance during the Argentinian dictatorship. Polínices becomes an empty shroud; his bodiless presence/absence enacts the impossibility of mourning. Antígona declares her will to keep burying her brother forever, as the mothers and grandmothers of the forced disappeared pledge to keep gathering at the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, asking for justice. Mourning remains incomplete, set in the future continuous tense. Antígona will keep returning, as a constant revenant.

Antígona’s return on stage is haunted by Western drama and literature. Furiosa alludes to the madness of Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1516),^[1]This reference to the Italian epic poem could also allude to the historical bonds between Italy and Argentina. but is also explicitly associated with Ophelia. In the beginning and the end  of the play, Gambaro quotes from Ophelia’s scene of madness. From Antígona’s burial dirt, we move to Ophelia’s watery grave. At some point, Creon speaks quoting the Gospels, as if he were Christ: ‘forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’ (Lukas 23:34). In contrast with Sophocles’ Antigone, who is opposed to Creon using the rational ‘language of men’, Furiosa, as her name and her connections to Ophelia betray, operates through a radically other voice. She even challenges her heroic status and assumes her fear: ‘In front of Creon, I was afraid. But he did not know’ (Delante de Creonte, tuve miedo. Pero él no lo supo) (p. 204).^[2]All the excerpts from Griselda Gambaro’s Antígona Furiosa are translated from Spanish to English by the authors. Overall, the play closely follows, and at the same time radically rereads, ancient tragedy. This repetition becomes a farce.

The version of Gambaro’s text we had at our disposal bears the traces of its readers; available online, it is full of handwritten notes, referring to the text itself but also to its staging.^[3]Griselda Gambaro’s Antígona Furiosa is available here: https://www.scribd.com/doc/237324655/Antigona-furiosa-Griselda-Gambaro. In one note, commenting on Antigone’s self-lament before going to her living tomb, we read: ‘Quote from Sophocles’ (Cita de Sófocles). The text that follows is indeed a quite precise quote from Sophocles’ text. The question that emerges, and defines our translators’ task, is: how do we translate into Modern Greek an Ancient Greek text translated into Spanish—and into a version of Spanish that is spoken in Argentina, peppered with the vernacular specificities of Rio de la Plata? What might these translocations from Gambaro to Sophocles and to our version in Modern Greek tell us about the multiplicities of Antigone’s returns today? Initially, we worked directly on rendering the Spanish text into Modern Greek. Yet, Gambaro’s writing itself, and its continuous allusions to Sophocles, led us to revisit the ancient text through its multiple renditions into Modern Greek. Our own translation became thus informed by other modern Greek translations that we found relevant today and saw in dialogue with Antígona Furiosa.

This process of incorporation further enhances the ways language works in Gambaro’s piece. The character of Antígona speaks in a ‘higher’ register, distinguishing herself from the sarcastic and parodic lines of the two male characters. This difference of language and style also relates to the way temporality works in the play, placing Corypheus and Antinous in a limited, mortal time, and Antigone in a position of continuous, repetitive return. The palimpsest here persists, as a parody. Antígona Furiosa, both as a character and a play, but also our palimpsestic translation of it, persistently ask: ‘Will the mockery ever end?’ (¿No terminará nunca la burla?) (p. 217).

References

Gambaro, G. (1989[1986]). Antígona Furiosa. Teatro 3, Ediciones de la Flor, pp. 195-217.

Marios Chatziprokopiou and Alkisti Efthymiou