A Model for Quality Evaluation of Poetry Translation: Cavafis in Spanish

Abstract

Until recently, translation quality assessment has been based on subjective criteria influenced by the dichotomy of «literal translation» versus «free translation». Over the last decades, some assessment models have been developed which generally fall into one of two large groups: analytic or holistic. Despite their being widely used in teaching and more technical fields, the assessment of literary genres has largely been left out of these developments. The main problem with the assessment of literary translations is that no such «evaluative leap», as those already applied in other domains have been taken: no numerical value is attached to indicators, so the results obtained are not contrastable or generalizable for further research. Our aim is to establish a standard to assess literary translations in a valid and reliable manner, generating values which shall be contrastable with those obtained in other studies.