Abstract

This paper focuses on how translators read source texts and claims that the process of reading is creative and dynamic. The discussion starts with the difference between communication through written letters and through spoken words, explaining a metaphoric expression of “language’s death”. After introducing the ideas of hermeneutics, the paper describes the relationship between an author and a reader. The reader does not understand the writer’s “horizon”, but understands the text’s “horizon”. This idea of horizon is explained with the idea of Hans-Georg Gadamer. The reader interprets the text using his/her creativity, and the idea of “mimèsis” by Paul Ricoeur explains that the reader actively interprets the narrative text. In the last part of this paper, an example of translators’ creative interpretation is shown from the original text and English translational texts of the Japanese narrative Night on the Milky Way Train by Kenji Miyazawa.