Translating landscape: Maria Parr’s Tonje Glimmerdal from an ecocritical perspective

Abstract

The article examines two sets of illustrations of the children’s novel Tonje Glimmerdal (2009) by Norwegian author Maria Parr. The original version in Norwegian, illustrated by Åshild Irgens, and the translation into Spanish, illustrated by Zuzanna Celej, are examined. The aim is to show how the concepts of nature and landscape are modified in the translated version. This analysis illuminates how illustrations have an impact on texts, and how illustrations create new meanings. While the original novel is considered a winter pastoral as young protagonist Tonje lives in the mountains and finds her purpose in life in her homeland valley, Irgens’ illustrations foreground Tonje’s actions, whereas Celej’s work is more focused on the landscape. The different ways in which these two versions of the book depict the winter pastoral, and the image of nature, are analysed from an ecocritical perspective, especially following Carol Glotfelty’s and Greg Garrard’s approaches.