Auroville the city of Humana unity. Translating children's literature in a context of a multicultural community

66 Chapter III - Children’s literature and the Translation of a work of Auroville Children’s Literature into Italian The third chapter aims to present a study of a work taken from Auroville children’s literature for which I have provided a translation into Italian, and an analysis regarding theories and deforming tendencies that occurred during the translation process. The work I have analysed and translated is a short story titled “The bird and only the BIRD”, a book written in English and Indian, which recalls Japan culture because of its origami form; the writing of this work is characterized by the presence of cultural specific items and proper names for which I have provided an analysis regarding translation theories. Before discussing children’s literature in Auroville and the translation process of the text I have chosen, I have analysed the birth and the development of world literature dedicated to children, taking in consideration how it has developed in India. Firstly, I take into account the major social and cultural contexts in which children’s literature developed, from its origins to the nineteenth century, focusing then, on the importance of India, as the cradle of Children’s literature thanks to its rich oral tradition and the Panchatantra, the oldest transcription in Sanskrit of animal fables, in verse and prose, which dates back the III century BC 186 , and which influenced the most known European author of this genre, Jean De La Fontaine, who in the incipit of his collection of fables wrote: “This is the second book of fables that I presented to the public. I have to acknowledge that the greatest part is inspired by Pilpay Vishnu Sharma 187 , an Indian sage”. 188 186 Hertel, Johannes, The Panchatantra, Cambridge Massachusetts, Harvard University, 1912 187 Pilpay Vishnu Sharma is the author of the Indian collection of fables “Panchatantra”, written around the 200 B.C. 188 Carbonaro, Creazzo, Tornesello, Macrotesti fra Oriente e Occidente: IV colloquio internazionale, De La Fontaine, Jean, Advertisement to the Second Compilation of Fables “Je dirai par reconnaissance que j’en dois la plus grande partie à Pilpay Vishnu Sharma, sage indien”, (1678), Rubbettino Editore, 2003, p.513