Back to the Future: The Journey of “The Bloody Chamber” in Italy and France

Starting with the premise that translation is not merely the rendering of words into a different linguistic code but is the result of a negotiation between two different cultural and literary traditions, this article examines the way in which the translation of The Bloody Chamber in France and Italy, which took place in both countries in 1985, allowed the collocation of the book in a particular cultural space, not necessarily similar to the one the book had in its original country. The first part considers the history of its publication in Italy, the choice of publisher, its presentation to the public through the paratextual material on the cover and the translator’s agency in negotiating between the Italian tradition of fairy tale writing and the new genre of the adult fairy tale. The second part considers its French translation, which by giving it a new title, La Compagnie des loups, signals a new process of manipulation that echoes Angela Carter’s own handling of the original French classics. Given that the translation had to negotiate not only Angela Carter’s text but also its links to Charles Perrault’s tales, the analysis highlights the results of this double journey and examine which alliances the translation built in relation with the new and old texts. The comparison of the results from the Italian and French analysis is aimed to a better understanding of the impact that the genre of the adult fairy tale had in two neighbouring cultural spaces.