Posts filed under 'writing the self'

Translation Tuesday: “The Painting of a Dream” by Sakthi Jothi

February 21, 2023  |  in Translations  |  by Thila Varghese

I am drawing an image of me that remains embedded in an undissolved dream of mine.

This Translation Tuesday, we feature the poetic reflections of Sakthi Jothi, translated from the Tamil by Thila Varghese. With painterly verse, Sakthi Jothi extracts a perfect image from the intensities of an “undissolved dream.” Feelings are captured in the lines, and colour and tools are sought to map their depths—but success may come at a price.

The Painting of a Dream

I am drawing
an image of me
that remains embedded
in an undissolved dream of mine.
I tried to put together a figure
by extending the lines in the summer
and contracting them in the winter,
stretching the lines farther
and erasing some of them as unwanted.
I painted it with colours
specific to each season.

It was only
during the times
passed in searching
for brushes and colours
to paint with precision
all the details,
such as the loneliness
that is undissolved by anything at all, READ MORE…

Coming Home to Everywhere: On Sanmao’s Stories of the Sahara

March 9, 2020  |  in Reviews  |  by Xiao Yue Shan

Closing the book, we are not left with the knowledge of what it was like to be there; we do so, knowing that she was there.

Stories of the Sahara by Sanmao, translated from the Chinese by Mike Fu, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020

Around ten the night is wine-inspired, and even the most tight-lipped Chinese émigrés, bruised from decades of survival, come around to reminiscing. Shenzhen and Xiamen and northeastern accents collide, comparing childhood hardships, fears, regrets. Sunflower shells are cracked and peanut skins snow the table, and the dialogue coheres at a single incredulous certainty: how lucky. How lucky we are to be here, because how easily it could have been otherwise.

One of the most beloved characters of most Chinese children born after 1940 is the infamous Sanmao (三毛 / Three Hairs), a pitiful orphan so impoverished he could only manage to grow, well, three hairs. Set largely in nationalist Shanghai, the narrative of Sanmao detailed his nomadic wanderings, involving most often ignominious miscarriages of justice, teetering hunger, and desperate, one-yuan schemes. Round-headed, ribcage-baring, picking up cigarette butts on the street, Sanmao was adored by children like myself—poor but not destitute, bred with an uncertain yet determined idea of the world’s cruelties, cultivating a helpless, weary sort of empathy for a two-dimensional friend.

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The Multilingual Carpathians: Weronika Gogola in Conversation

January 30, 2019  |  in Interviews  |  by Julia Sherwood

“Only by picking up a magnifying glass and taking a close look at things can you see the truth about yourself and others.”

Weronika Gogola is a Polish writer and translator from Slovak and Ukrainian. Her first autobiographical book Po trochu (Little by Little, 2017), which depicts her childhood in the small village of Olszyny in the Carpathian mountains, is composed of “stories from real life that are usually told bit by bit, in snippets and fragments.” The book was nominated for several literary prizes and in October 2018 won the Conrad Award for a prose debut. For the past three years, Gogola has been based in Bratislava, where Julia Sherwood, Asymptote’s Editor-at-Large for Slovakia, caught up with her last November.

Julia Sherwood: First of all, congratulations on winning the Conrad Award! I loved your book and think that the prize was more than deserved. What does it mean for you?

Weronika Gogola: This award is incredibly important to me, especially since, in the case of the Conrad Award, it’s not just the judges who decide but, first and foremost, the readers. I’m incredibly grateful to them. Besides, a prize is a kind of validation, as well as a bargaining chip for the future. I know that sounds unfair but that’s how the world works—the more prizes and nominations you have the more seriously you are taken. Unfortunately. But, of course, it’s nice to be appreciated. In addition, the Conrad Award includes a grant, which has allowed me to concentrate on my writing without financial worries.

JS: Your book is very firmly located in the world of your childhood. You grew up in a small village in rural Poland, yet ended up living abroad, and are currently based in Slovakia. Were you already living abroad while working on your book, and did the geographical distance give you a new perspective on the place, or did this make the writing more challenging?

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