Since the end of the 20th century and beginning of the 21st, new Hebrew literature has seen a steep rise in the number of its translations into the dominant languages of the literary centers of the Western world: English, French, German, Spanish, Dutch and Italian. Thus, large parts of contemporary Hebrew literature are being written, distributed and read under conditions of a global literary space, in translation. Prominent parts of Hebrew literature exist in multiple literary spaces, and their translatability is embodied in them. The article characterizes that translatability by a comparative reading of two Hebrew detective series: the Elish Ben Zeken series by Shimon Adaf, which has yet to be translated, and the Avraham Avraham series by Dror Mishani, which has been translated into numerous languages. The article discusses the textual differences between the two novel series, using Bahktin’s concept of heteroglossia, and shows how a novel whose heteroglossic structure is split and conflicted will tend to remain within the boundaries of Hebrew, whereas a novel whose heteroglossic structure is based on a single, unified language, contains a greater potential for movement from one language to another. Finally, the article correlates those heteroglossic structures with popularity, as well as with commerciality.

https://doi.org/10.70959/tac.54.2021.87114