The Maltese and the Mustard Fields: Oulipian Translation

The notion that literary texts are inherently untranslatable is all too familiar. However, as Henri Meschonnic points out, untranslatability is not an absolute; the practical and theoretical specificity of translation varies according to each text’s particular practice of language (313). This essay considers a set of writing practices that pose particular challenges for translators: those associated with the Ouvroir de littérature potentielle (Workshop for Potential Literature) or Oulipo. Founded in 1960 by Raymond Queneau and François Le Lionnais, the Oulipo is a group of mathematicians and writers who explore the use of rules and restrictions (generally referred to as “constraints”) in writing. For the purposes of this paper, I will limit my discussion to two Oulipians: the French writer Georges Perec (1936-1982) and the American writer Harry Mathews (b. 1930).