Posts featuring Andri Snær Magnason

What’s New in Translation: March 2021

The best in world literature from Iceland, Palestine, Algeria, and Japan!

This month, our selection of excellent new publications are representative of literature’s capacity for translating worldly phenomenon into language, converting the lived into the understood. From Iceland, a passionate and intimate call to response on the tragedies of environmental destruction; from Palestine, a monumental work of love and resistance from “the Virginia Woolf of Palestine,” Sahar Kalifeh; from Algeria, a sensual novel that treads the tenuous territory of colonialism’s aftereffects; and from Japan, the English-language debut of Akutagawa-winner Kikuko Tsumura, who with graceful humour and intrigue tackles the toxic concept of labour in the thrive of capitalism.  

on time and water

On Time and Water by Andri Snær Magnason, translated from the Icelandic by Lytton Smith, Open Letter, 2021

Review by Rachel Farmer, Chief Executive Assistant

When Greta Thunberg addressed the UN Climate Summit in September 2019, she choked back tears as she uttered the now infamous words: “How dare you?” Reactions to this display of emotion were mixed to say the least. Some showed discomfort, others concern for her wellbeing; some dismissed her outburst as manipulative, others ridiculed her. Her face and words were even immortalised in meme format. In displaying her anguish and rage so plainly, Thunberg violated the unspoken rule that seems to underpin much of the communication and discussion around climate change, wherein impassivity, stoicism, and detachment reign supreme.

In On Time and Water—part memoir, part interview, part impassioned treatise on the future of our planet—Andri Snær Magnason follows the young Swedish activist’s example, casting aside convention and delving into the emotional side of the climate crisis. In doing so, he embarks on a deeply humane and vulnerable exploration of what manmade climate change truly means for the planet—and for us. In this compelling hybrid of a book, translated sensitively by Lytton Smith, he explains how, a few years ago, he was called upon to defend a region in his country’s highlands from being destroyed in the name of energy production. Despite his deep admiration for the spiritual fervour with which Helgi Valtýsson, another Icelandic writer, wrote about the region in 1945, Magnason found himself unable to infuse the same passion into his defence. Bringing emotions into the discussion would have risked his arguments being dismissed as hysterical, doommongering, or hopelessly idealistic.

I’d found myself overwhelmed by melancholy at the unruly devastation that washed out this peerless region, yet I chose words that seemed moderate and inviting to readers. I used the prevailing language of liberalism, innovation, utilitarianism, and marketing. I discussed the area’s importance for Iceland’s image, its potential tourist income, the area’s research value, how the highlands were a magnet for foreign currency as a filming location for movies or commercials. [. . .] We live in times when money is the measure of reality. I couldn’t argue nature’s right to exist, its essential value, by saying that we might find God’s all-encompassing expanse there. READ MORE…

The Voice of Interiority: Lytton Smith on Translating Sigrún Pálsdóttir’s History. A Mess.

[The inward-looking quality] structurally and stylistically governs how the novel is written, its very form.

Sigrún Pálsdóttir’s profound and inward-looking saga, History. A Mess., was July’s Asymptote Book Club selection, translated from Icelandic to English. Callum McAllister speaks to the novel’s translator, Lytton Smith, on the process of translating this sweeping and intuitive work. In this conversation, the two discuss the intricacies of translating the evasive language of space and the even more mysterious language of the inner self, and Lytton gives as well some much-appreciated recommendations of Icelandic literature.

Callum McAllister (CM): Iceland is well-known for its impressively high literary output and vibrant creative culture, but Icelandic isn’t a widely spoken language. Are you daunted by how much Icelandic literature has yet to be translated into English, or do you think it gives you more freedom to opt for your favorite texts? Is there anything you’d love to see in English or work on next?

Lytton Smith (LS): Definitely daunted, even as I’m excited by the opportunity! There are wonderful translators from Icelandic working to bring more books into English (which can then also be a gateway to other languages), but there’s a limit to how many presses are willing to do what Open Letter does and take a chance on publishing titles—especially when translations are hard to sell to readers. I’m looking forward to Sigrún’s next novel, which is in part about the theory that Icelanders “discovered” America, and Ófeigur Sigurðsson, whose novel Öræfi / The Wastelands I translated last year (Deep Vellum), has another two novels that center on volcanoes that I’d like to translate. And I’d love to translate another book by the amazing, singular Kristín Ómarsdóttir. Next up, I’m lucky to be translating some of Andri Snær Magnason’s work.

READ MORE…