ABSTRACT
There is a big question revolving around the word ‘teaching’ in the title of this chapter. What does it mean to ‘teach’ literary translation, and, even more importantly, what does it mean to ‘learn’ it? Indeed, what is the ‘it’ we are supposed to be teaching and learning? Like Julian Barnes’s description of novel-writing (Barnes 1986), ‘doing’ literary translation means doing many complex things simultaneously and well. How do translators ‘learn’ this craft, art or whatever it might be? What are the principle components of the literary translator’s skill, and how can these best be acquired?
