Against Translation. The Struggle Over Translation for the Stage in the (Late) Dutch Golden Age

In the multilingual society of the Republic of the United Provinces of the early modern period, translation was an extremely widespread social practice. At the Amsterdam Theatre as well (Amsterdamse Schouwburg, founded in 1637), the repertoire consisted in a great deal of translations and adaptations of foreign plays, both classic and contemporary. Much new light has been shed recently on theatre repertoires and the agents involved in them, including the intermediaries. In this paper I focus on a debate for and against translation for the stage which broke out between ca. 1665 and 1680, as well as on the cultural and social implications of this struggle in which translation was foregrounded.