Francisco Ayala and his professional approach to translation theory and practice

Abstract

Francisco Ayala (Granada, 1906-Madrid, 2009), member of the Royal Academy of Spanish Language, sociologist, hispanist and renowned writer, was also a translator for many years, especially, at the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939, when he was forced into exile in Buenos Aires. As far as we know, little attention has been devoted from Translation Studies to his facet as a translator and theorist. As we will try to narrate in the following lines, Francisco Ayala earned a living from translation for many years and reflected about this activity in his Breve teoría de la traducción (1946; Brief Theory of Translation). Among other authors, he translated Thomas Mann and Rainer Maria Rilke from German, Almeida from Portuguese and Léon Bloy from French. In this paper, we will only be able to outline a part of Ayala's merits, since, in our opinion, his vast production, as a writer, translator and theorist constitutes a fabulous playground for researchers in our discipline.