Unexpected Resemblance of Distant Cousins: Can Iranian and Polish Cultures Meet in Translation?

Despite geographical distance, Polish and Iranian cultures share not only Indo-European origins but also similar recent historical and literary experiences. These areas of cultural proximity can occasionally enrich the repertoire of strategies available in translation. Given the general tendency towards exoticisation when translating Persian texts into Polish, careful consideration of shared cultural notions, as well as the limited inscription of domestic ideas (in Lawrence Venuti’s terms), emerges as a particularly valid direction for study. Drawing on methodology of translation studies, this article analyses strategies for translating a lengthy poem by the prominent Iranian modern poet Foruq Farroxzād, Oh, Land Full of Treasures… (Ey marz-e por-gowhar…). By comparing this social satire – written in Mohammad Reza Pahlavi’s Iran – with its Polish counterparts from the communist and pre-WWII eras, as well as its English and Italian translations, the author highlights commonly unrecognized cultural and historical similarities that facilitate the straightforward translation of humour and satiric allusions between Persian and Polish. This comparison demonstrates that the Polish literary idiom is fully capable of providing satisfactory equivalents for terms reflecting such aspects of the second Pahlavi reign as bureaucracy, ideologized language, corruption, and censorship. Moreover, the longing for past glory and the hypocrisy mocked by Farroxzād in Iranians are national flaws often referenced by her Polish counterparts.