Translation Tuesday: “The Imaginary Pet,” “On Dragons”

July 1, 2014 | in Translations | by Ellen Jones

Surreal tales from Mexican author Cecilia Eudave, translated by criticism editor Ellen Jones

The Imaginary Pet

As I was drinking my tea and noting the unique colour of the jacaranda tree, I was struck suddenly by a sad, painful memory: my first pet. She wasn’t cruel or aggressive, quite the opposite, she was a sweet creature, delicate and extremely intelligent (she taught me to read), with a slender body the colour of a jacaranda, so skinny she could have passed for a bookmark. She was my best friend, she went with me everywhere, slept in my bed, came out with me in my bag, played games with me, sang me to sleep. She always kept watch over my dreams, and with her by my side no nightmare ever dared enter my head.

Untranslating Children’s Nonsense Poems

May 5, 2014 | in Dispatches, Essays | by M. Lynx Qualey

"The Bengali literary mafia would say: 'This is untranslatable.'"

When Indian author Sampurna Chatterji was growing up, she lived between several languages. Her father taught English, while her mother taught Bengali. In Chatterji’s own schooling, the instructional language was English, but she also learned Hindi and Sanskrit.

“All this creates a sort of strange cacophony in the head,” Chatterji said at a professional seminar at this year’s Abu Dhabi International Book Fair, held from April 30 to May 5.

But this “cacophony” also creates wonderful opportunities for linguistic connections. As she developed as a writer, Chatterji decided not to write in Bengali. “The burden of being Bengali was too much for me,” she said. Her teenage rebellion was not to go off and smoke, but to write in English. READ MORE…

Contributor:

M. Lynx Qualey

Places:

Abu Dhabi
Bangladesh

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Weekly News Roundup, 4th April 2014: Wiki-Dictionaries, Muhammed: the Opera, Translating Kafka and Joyce

April 4, 2014 | in News | by Patty Nash

This week's literary highlights from across the world

Happy April! It’s too late for April Fool’s trickery at the roundup, but the announcement of German publisher PediaPress’ proposal to print out all of Wikipedia—yes, all four million articles, amounting to one thousand volumes and a bookcase eight feet long and 32 feet high—certainly seems like a prank of Rushdie-selfie proportions. READ MORE…

Contributor:

Patty Nash

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But will translators scare the children?

April 3, 2014 | in Essays | by M. Lynx Qualey

"My sons can handle knowing their Calvino was translated."

My first literary entanglement—or the first one I remember—was with folktales. While Danish and German tales were undoubtedly my introduction to the form, by the time memory kicks in, I am scouring local libraries and filling Christmas wish lists with requests for Greek myths, Norwegian sagas, Chinese tales, Italian fairy stories (yes, the Calvino), and any others that an intrepid relative might find.