Márgara Villegas, Translator of John Dos Passos into Spanish

Abstract

When analyzing the relationship of John Dos Passos and Spain, the name of José Robles, his friend and translator of Manhattan Transfer into Spanish, invariably appears; his misterious killing by the Russians during the Spanish Civil War is central to understand John Dos Passos’ relationship with Spain and his political shift. In this narrative, Márgara Villegas, Robles’s wife, has always played a secondary role, that of a victim. However, Márgara Villegas also translated John Dos Passos and other writers in the Spain of the Second Republic for Cenit, and later, in exile in Mexico, for the Fondo de Cultura Económica. In this article we will deal with her work as a translator, to provide a fuller picture of a brave, admirable woman, despite the circumnstances that made her husband, the Spanish translator of Manhattan Transfer, tragically visible in the Spanish polysystem.