Description

Alfonsina Storni (1892-1938) probably wrote Mr. Dougall’s Weakness between 1927 and 1931, though it was never performed in the author’s lifetime. Dougall is a manipulative white Englishman with a successful whisky tasting career. His wife, an Afro-Argentine woman named Carmen, finds herself trapped in an unhappy marriage; Dougall offers Carmen a life filled with luxury but devoid of morals. In this way, Storni’s vision of the marriage between the "gringo" and the “criolla” contradicts  prevailing nationalist discourses, which frequently romanticized European culture and industry. Dougall’s racism is as exaggerated as is alcoholism. Finally, as Carmen loses patience with Dougall, she asserts her right to cultural autonomy.

Excerpt:

DOUGALL: (He leaves laughing, revealing just how drunk he is.) Me? Me, a drunk? I drink for a living. Don’t you know that? Drinking is my job. It’s my profession and I have the most refined palate in the world! I’m not some useless bum. I don’t drink because I have a vice or because I’m lazy. No other man can taste whisky as well as I can. I have sacrificed my life for whisky, with the goal of becoming the best judge in my field. You’re calling me a drunk? You don’t understand a thing. You aren’t making sense! (He laughs.)

CARMEN: Well, I am making sense. You being drunk is a fact that no one can deny.

DOUGALL: Shut your mouth, Señora! You might have beautiful brown skin, but you come from an inferior race. You have no ideals, no purpose, no need to aspire toward perfection.

CARMEN: I do have a purpose. And I’ll be leaving you if you don’t switch jobs and stop drinking.

Translators' Note:

As we translated of La debilidad de Mr. Dougall, we paid close attention to Storni's use of Spanglish, culturally-specific regionalisms, racialized terms, and the jargon of the 1920s.

In the original script, Storni occasionally sprinkles Dougall's lines with English. Here, we have reversed that tendency. Instead of breaking into English, Dougall occasionally speaks Spanish (badly). We have written Dougall's Spanish pronunciation phonetically to emphasize Dougall’s British accent and preference for exaggeration. Examples include the following:

“Heroine” : “Her-o-ween-ah” 

“Very well,” : “ Moo-wee bee-yen"

“Technique” : “Tec-knee-kah"

“Gentleman” : “Cab-a-year-ow” 

“Butterfly” : “Mar-ee-poh-sah” -

The Spanish use in our translation captures Dougall's over-the-top superiority complex. When Dougall proudly exhibits his superficial command of Spanish, the audience/reader glimpses his arrogance along with his weakness. Dougall doesn’t understand Argentina any better than he undersands his wife. The juxtoposition of language in both the original and in the translation illustrates differences in ideologies between the characters. Dougall is a blatant Eurocentric capitalist who dismisses the merits of his host country; Carmen represents the Argentine working class and quickly sees through Dougall's facade. 

Our translation left a few regionalisms in Spanish too. For example, we decided not to translate words like "criolla," "caña," and "yerba mate," because these phrases closely align with Argentina. The available English equivalences did not sound culturally authentic.

Terms related to race and racism presented additional challenges. Balancing the scales between the pride Carmen feels as a Black woman and Dougall’s very clear racism required us to chose our words with great care. We avoided using dehumanizing vocabulary whenever possible, but we did not soften Dougall's racism in the slightest. 

Finally, we researched 1920s slang in order to use the terms that would fit the decade. Such was the case for "attagirl" and "go kick rocks." 

Special thanks to Loretta Norwalk for her participation in the first English-language dramatic reading of Mr. Dougall's Weakness.

"Mr.Dougall's Weakness" PDF: 

Citation: 

May Farnsworth, Abel Guzman, and Paulina Tejada Cabreja, translators, "Mr. Dougal's Weakness (La Debilidad de Mr. Dougall, c 1927) by Alfonsina Storni,” galeriahispana.omeka.net, Feminist Revivals Spanish and Hispanic Studies Digital Gallery at HWS, 2023.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.