The Translator Translated: Foreign Versions of Haroldo de Campo’s Transcreation Theory

Haroldo de Campos’s transcreation theory and practice have received significant attention in Brazil and abroad over the past decades. His incorporation of foreign poets via translation has been understood through the metaphor of “anthropophagic devouring” used by Haroldo de Campos himself. However, not much energy has been put into understanding the extensive network of international translation agents he set forth to promote foreign versions of his own poems and essays. Learning from his American master, Ezra Pound, to be an “entrepreneur of the arts”, Haroldo de Campos tried to publicise foreign versions of his poems and essays in different languages, as evidenced by his continued effort to publish them in international journals and books. Based on a survey of foreign versions in six different languages ​​(Spanish, English, French, German, Polish and Italian) of his 20 most significant essays on his transcreation theory, we aim to understand its wide dissemination abroad.