The Serbian Translation of Heijermans’s Op Hoop van Zegen

Abstract

One hundred years after its performance at the Serbian National Theatre in Novi Sad, the Serbian translation of Heijermans’s Op Hoop van Zegen (The Good Hope), which has been preserved in handwritten form, was finally published for the first time. Further investigation has shown that this translation was made for the 1905 premiere at the National Theatre in Belgrade and that the translator used the German translation by Franziska de Graaff as the source text. A thorough analysis of his translation reveals his translation strategies but also shows that there are slight changes that could refer to his own input or to another source. Moreover, entire passages have been crossed out, but without any further explanation of that procedure.

As for the reception of the performances, the sparse reviews testify that it was not an unqualified success with the public. An anonymous reviewer especially blamed Heijermans for his oversimplified criticism of capitalism. Two others saw the problem mainly in the poor staging and poor division of roles.

Nevertheless, Heijermans appears to have left several traces in Serbian reception history, which is mainly due to his fame in Germany. After all, peripheral cultures reach each other easier through central mediators.