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More About This Textbook
Overview
How does a book become an international bestseller? What happens to it as it is translated into different languages, contexts, and societies? How is it changed by the intellectual environments it encounters? What does the transnational circulation mean for its reception back home? Exploring the international life of a particularly long-lived and widely traveled book, Isabel Hofmeyr follows The Pilgrim's Progress as it circulates through multiple contexts—and into some 200 languages—focusing on Africa, where 80 of the translations occurred.
This feat of literary history is based on intensive research that criss-crossed among London, Georgia, Kingston, Bedford (John Bunyan's hometown), and much of sub-Saharan Africa. Finely written and unusually wide-ranging, it accounts for how The Pilgrim's Progress traveled abroad with the Protestant mission movement, was adapted and reworked by the societies into which it traveled, and, finally, how its circulation throughout the empire affected Bunyan's standing back in England.
The result is a new intellectual approach to Bunyan—one that weaves together British, African, and Caribbean history with literary and translation studies and debates over African Christianity and mission. Even more important, this book is a rare example of a truly worldly study of "world literature"—and of the critical importance of translation, both linguistic and cultural.
Editorial Reviews
Modern Language Quarterly - Stephanie Newell
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, The Portable Bunyan remains a treasure trove of hitherto unrecorded stories and ideas. At times quirky and humorous, provocative and politicized, the book is likely to inspire debates and repositionings in Bunyan scholarship and postcolonial studies. . . . [Hofmeyer] builds layers of intriguing stories and penetrating analyses, composed in a work that will capture readers in its own web of prose.The International Journal of African Historical Studies - Paul Landau
[A] nuanced portrayal, one that succeeds in being about far more than 'how Africa changed Bunyan.' It shades into, and occasionally moves toward becoming, a book about world historical processes and literary identity.Choice
The author includes much fascinating material on the numerous areas of African life that were influenced by, and transformed for their own purposes, Bunyan's epic. . . . The Portable Bunyan will repay the attention of cultural anthropologists as well as students of literature, folklore, and religion.J. Modern Language Quarterly
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, The Portable Bunyan remains a treasure trove of hitherto unrecorded stories and ideas. At times quirky and humorous, provocative and politicized, the book is likely to inspire debates and repositionings in Bunyan scholarship and postcolonial studies. . . . [Hofmeyer] builds layers of intriguing stories and penetrating analyses, composed in a work that will capture readers in its own web of prose.— Stephanie Newell
The International Journal of African Historical Studies
[A] nuanced portrayal, one that succeeds in being about far more than 'how Africa changed Bunyan.' It shades into, and occasionally moves toward becoming, a book about world historical processes and literary identity.— Paul Landau
J. Modern Language Quarterly
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, The Portable Bunyan remains a treasure trove of hitherto unrecorded stories and ideas. At times quirky and humorous, provocative and politicized, the book is likely to inspire debates and repositionings in Bunyan scholarship and postcolonial studies. . . . [Hofmeyer] builds layers of intriguing stories and penetrating analyses, composed in a work that will capture readers in its own web of prose.— Stephanie Newell
Product Details
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Table of Contents
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS xiii
PROLOGUE 1
INTRODUCTION
Portable Texts: Bunyan, Translation, and Transnationality 11
PART ONE
BUNYAN IN THE PROTESTANT ATLANTIC
1
The Congo on Camden Road 45
2
Making Bunyan Familiar in the Mission Domain 56
3
Translating Bunyan 76
4
Mata's Hermeneutic: Internationally Made Ways of Reading Bunyan 98
PART TWO
BUNYAN, THE PUBLIC SPHERE, AND AFRICA
5
John Bunyan Luthuli: African Mission Elites and The Pilgrim's Progress 113
6
Dreams, Documents, and Passports to Heaven: African Christian Interpretations of The Pilgrim's Progress 137
7
African Protestant Masculinities in the Empire: Ethel M. Dell, Thomas Mofolo, and Mr. Great-heart 151
8
Illustrating Bunyan 173
9
Bunyan in the African Novel 191
PART THREE
POST-BUNYAN
10
How Bunyan Became English 217
CONCLUSION
Lifting the Tollgates 228
APPENDIX 1
Bunyan Translations by Language 240
APPENDIX 2
A Social Profile of Bunyan Translators 244
NOTES 247
BIBLIOGRAPHY 281
INDEX 307