Apologetics and poetics: a translator’s reflections on Judith Teixeira’s use of her own poetry in the public lecture de mim

This article is structured around my translation of two of Judith Teixeira’s most iconic poems into English. When, in 1926, Teixeira published De Mim in defence of her work and aesthetics, she chose two of her own poems to exemplify and elucidate her poetics and her sexual politics. I begin by briefly contextualising De Mim, which was written in the style of a literary apologia but also intended to be given as a public lecture. The poems are then presented in bilingual format. Based upon the experience of translating these poems, I conclude by assessing how well they support Teixeira’s call for artists to be allowed to create, unencumbered by hypocritical bourgeois moralising.