Dr Anna Lanfranchi (Manchester), '"Requests Continued to Flow in": The Translation Rights Market in Italy During and in the Aftermath of the Second World War'

Caught between the Fascist years from the one side and the postwar era from the other one, the 1943-1945 biennium has often been overlooked by research on the history of the Italian translation marked. Having been severely disrupted by political upheavals and wartime destructions, the publication of translated texts in the mid-1940s has therefore been perceived as a suspended activity during the second, momentous, phase of the war. Yet, behind closed doors, Italian publishers as well as the Allies were making preparations for the end of the conflict. Drawing on archival data collected in Italy and in the United Kingdom, Dr Lanfranchi's paper will explore how publishers and agents attempted to overcome the constraints of war years on purchasing translation rights. Furthermore, it will consider the role that British and US governmental agencies attributed to printed items and copyright as means of cultural propaganda, whose distribution to both occupied territories and newly liberated areas of Europe was promoted, financially and operatively, even to the detriment of the authors’ interests. 

Respondent: Dr Mila Milani (Warwick)