The Worlds of Langston Hughes: Modernism and Translation in the Americas

375 Pages·2012·4.337 MB·English

by  Vera M. Kutzinski

The Worlds of Langston Hughes

The Worlds of
Langston Hughes
Modernism and Translation in the Americas
VERA M. KUTZINSKI
CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS
Ithaca & London
Copyright © 2012 by Cornell University
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof,
must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street,
Ithaca, New York 14850.
First published 2012 by Cornell University Press
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kutzinski, Vera M., 1956–
The worlds of Langston Hughes : modernism and translation in the Americas / Vera M.
Kutzinski.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8014-5115-7 (cloth : alk. paper)—
ISBN 978-0-8014-7826-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Hughes, Langston, 1902–1967—Translations—History and criticism. 2. Hughes,
Langston, 1902–1967—Appreciation. 3. Modernism (Literature)—America. I. Title.
PS3515.U274Z6675 2013
811'.52—dc23 2012009952
Lines from “Kids in the Park,” “Cross,” “I, Too,” “Our Land,” “Florida Road Workers,”
“Militant,” “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” “Laughers,” “Ma Man,” “Desire,” “Always
the Same,” “Letter to the Academy,” “A New Song,” “Birth,” “Caribbean Sunset,”
“Hey!,” “Afraid,” “Final Curve,” “Poet to Patron,” “Ballads of Lenin," “Lenin,” “Union,”
“History,” “Cubes,” “Scottsboro,” “One More S in the U.S.A.,” and “Let America Be
America Again” from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes by Langston Hughes, edited
by Arnold Rampersad with David Roessel, Associate Editor, copyright © 1994 by the Estate
of Langston Hughes. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House,
Inc. Electronic rights worldwide and UK/Commonwealth, S. African and Irish print on paper
rights for these poems and for materials from Langston Hughes’s autobiographies are granted
by Harold Ober Associates Inc.
Cornell University Press strives to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials
to the fullest extent possible in the publishing of its books. Such materials include vegetable-
based, low-VOC inks and acid-free papers that are recycled, totally chlorine-free, or partly
composed of nonwood fibers. For further information, visit our website at
www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.
Cloth printing 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To my extended family, acá y allá

contents
Acknowledgments ix
C hronology of Travels, Translations, and Other Key Publications xi
Abbreviations xvi
I ntroduction: In Others’ Words: Translation and Survival 1
1 Nomad Heart: Heterolingual Autobiography 15
2 Southern Exposures: Hughes in Spanish 56
3 Buenos Aires Blues: Modernism in the Creole City 86
4 Havana Vernaculars: The Cuba Libre Project 132
5 Back in the USSA: Joe McCarthy’s Mistranslations 184
Afterword: America/América/Americas 221
Appendix 241
Notes 257
Bibliography 311
Index 339
vii

acknowledgments
This book has been a long time in the making, and the debts of gratitude
I have incurred along the way are plentiful indeed. Even if I could recall
them all accurately, it would be impossible to do them justice in writing.
I do, however, want to single out those friends and colleagues who were
generous enough to comment on my many drafts: Elizabeth Barnett, Hu-
bert Cook, Paula Covington, Roberto González Echevarría, Detlev Eggers,
Kathleen de Guzmán, Amanda Hagood, Justin Haynes, Robert Kelz, John
Morell, Chris Pexa, Kathrin Seidl-Gómez, Daniel Spoth, Aubrey Porter-
field, José María Rodríguez García, and Lacey Saborido. For invaluable
help with locating translations of Hughes’s poetry, I want to thank Paula
Covington, Curator of the Latin American Studies Collection at Vander-
bilt, Jim Toplon, Director of Interlibrary Loan Services at Vanderbilt, and
Laurie N. Taylor, Digital Humanities Librarian at the George A. Smathers
Libraries, University of Florida. Very special thanks go to Giorleny Altami-
rano Rayo, mi hermanita, and to the ever-faithful EE-gor. Without their
mostly gentle but insistent prodding this book would likely never have
been completed. Ange Romeo-Hall and Jamie Fuller did a splendid job
copyediting my manuscript, and I am grateful to them for saving me from
embarrassing infelicities. I thank Kitty Liu for making sure that everything
kept moving along apace. Last but by no means least, my heartfelt gratitude
goes to Peter Potter for his thoughtful feedback, his choice of engaged and
helpful readers, and his unwavering support for this project over the past
few years.
Earlier versions of chapters 2 and 4 were published as “ ‘Yo también soy
América’: Langston Hughes Translated,” in American Literary History 18,
no. 3 (2006): 550–78, and as “Fearful Asymmetries: Langston Hughes,
Nicolás Guillén and Cuba Libre” in Diacritics 34, nos. 1–2 (2004): 1–29.
I thank Random House for the permission to reprint lines from Hughes’s
poems and Harold Ober Associates Inc. for granting the electronic rights to
excerpts from Hughes’s poetry and prose. The materials from the Langston
Hughes Papers, part of the James Weldon Johnson Memorial Collection
at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University, are
also quoted with the permission of the Estate of Langston Hughes. Passages
from the Alfred A. Knopf correspondence at Beinecke Library are reprinted
with the permission of Random House Inc., and citations from the poems
ix