Christa Schuenke is a multiple award-winning literary translator. Among her more than 180 translations of works from almost all literary genres, there are also numerous first and new translations of classic works. In addition to her extensive teaching and lecturing activities at home and abroad, Christa Schuenke was vice president and writers-in-exile representative of the PEN Centre Germany from 2009 to 2013.
Relationship /
field of work /
interests
In what context do you work on questions of aesthetics/art?
Christa Schuenke: As a literary translator, I work primarily with language and literature.
What interests you most?
CS: Classical and new English, Irish and American literature.
Do you have a ‘favourite work’? And why that work in particular?
CS: Shakespeare’s sonnets have fascinated me since my youth. My love of the English language is not least due to this poetry. A masterpiece in its unity of content and form, often stretched to breaking point. The fascination continues, even after my translation was published by DTV almost 30 years ago.
Art / Concept of art / Understanding of art
What defines art?
CS: Art usually arises from a creatively intended, surprising new look at the familiar day-to-day.
How does art ‘work’?
CS: By artists creatively highlighting or linking content (natural or human-made objects and/or contexts) and placing them in often unusual contexts according to their individual perspective. Art is therefore first and foremost something very subjective, but it has an impact on society.
What does art achieve?
CS: Ideally, it serves to delight, instruct and edify. It also has therapeutic qualities, and in the form of the art market, especially in the field of fine art, it has now become an enormously lucrative economic factor.
Society / Relevance / Scholarship
What role does aesthetics/art play in our society?
CS: Art reflects social conditions and debates.
What role should aesthetics/art play in our society?
CS: This is precisely the role art should play – to reflect conditions, to mirror debates, but also to initiate or keep them going. If art is to be truly independent and remain strictly subjective, it needs support from the state and the private sector.
What role should scholarship play in this context?
CS: Scholarship can provide valuable impulses.