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Arabic Translation – A History

~ bythefirelight

The Complete Review has a link to a review in the National of a new history of translation and Arabic, Prison-house of Language. The author raises some interesting issues about translation and power, but what caught my eye was this paragraph.

The translation of Arab literature into western languages yokes it to western sensibilities and conventions. As Kilito muses, “Who can read an Arab poet or novelist today without establishing a relationship between him and his European peers? We Arabs have invented a special way of reading: we read an Arabic text while thinking about the possibility of transferring it into a European language.” That long thread of Arab language and culture unravels under the heat of the European gaze. “Woe to the writers for whom we find no European counterparts: we simply turn away from them, leaving them in a dark, abandoned isthmus, a passage without mirrors to reflect their shadow or save them from loss and deathlike abandon.”

I have had the feeling at times when I read a story that was originally writen in Arabic, that it is so different in style and approach from the common ways of writing stories in the US and Europe that I’m not sure what to make of it. Is it good? Os it considered good there and I just don’t understand? Hassouna Moshbahi’s The Tortoise in Sardines and Oranges is a perfect example. Using the refrains “that was my first adventure” and “they beat me” the story mixes day dreams, boyish adventures and descriptions of everyday life in Tunisa. There is no ephinanic moment, no Frytag’s triangle, so what is going on? At such moments I think of the reverse, too, when Nagib Mahfouz talks about looking for models for his fiction. In each case, the cultural associations on each side make it difficult to know what the tradition is.

Turbine – New Zealand Writing

~ bythefirelight

I’ve been reading through Turbine recently. There is some good stuff, but what caught my eye, and what I wish more magazines would do, are the audio clips of the authors reading the work. It adds more favor when you hear the words in the author’s own words, especially if the English you speak is spoken differently than their’s.

El País – Best Books of 2008

~ bythefirelight

El País has published there list of the best books of 2008. It is an interesting list and comparing it to the lists I’ve seen in major English language presses it is quickly obvious who many translations made the list. Chelsa Beach is number one on their list.

Author Interview Shows – El publico lee

~ bythefirelight

I was watching El publico lee on Canal Sur the other day and I began to think about who this show differed from some of the others I’ve seen in the recent past on in the US. For those of you who don’t know, El publico lee is a Spanish author interview show. But it also has people from the general public who have read the book and ask the author questions. Between the sets and the seriousness Canal Sur gives to the author it makes for, perhaps, a better show than those I’ve seen in the US. That said, I’ve never thought Book TV on CSPAN2 was that bad, except that it doesn’t cover any fiction. If you understand Spanish I would give it a look. My one complaint is they don’t archive more than two weeks of shows, so if you miss it, that’s too bad. I never did get to watch the end of the interview with Najat el Hachni and the book sounded interesting.

Micro Fiction or Star Trek Fiction (sp)

~ bythefirelight

I always find it fascinating when Star Trek can inspires literary art that really has nothing to do with sci-fi. A few weeks ago, or was it a month now, La Jornada published this bit of fun.

2.- Su cuerpo llega mal acomodado: debe caminar con las orejas, hablar por las uñas, orinar por la nariz, ver por las nalgas, fornicar con un pulmón, escuchar por un ventrículo, sudar hacia el interior, defecar dérmicamente, pensar con los cojones (algo que a muchos nos sucede).

His body arrives in bad shape: he has to walk on his ears, talk with his fingernails, pee trough the nose, see trough his ass, listen with his ventricle, sweat inside, defecate trough the skin, think with his balls (something that we men do).

Horacio Castellanos Moya Interviews

~ bythefirelight

I was on the Talpajocote blog and found links to some interviews with Horacio Castellanos Moya. Each are ten minutes long and worth watching.

In the first, from a Spanish TV station, he talks about how he traveled around Central America when he was young, hoping that the country would become democratic and eventually gave up and moved to Mexico. He returned to El Salvador 10 years later, but left again, disillusioned. He also talks about Tirana memoria his latest book. He mentions the title comes from something a character at the end of Donde no estén ustedes says, which along with Desmoronamiento, is part of a trilogy. He describes what he sees as the focus of the book is: the growing liberty and awakening of a woman while her husband is in prison, as if his imprisonment is her liberation.

In the second, more literary, but a little bit more difficult to understand, he talks about how he sees Mexico as the capital of Meso America, and Salvador as one of the small provinces of the area. Central American and Mexico are not as different from each other as Central America is to South America. He also mentions that a lack of literary tradition in El Salvador has led him to use the language itself as tradition. It is liberating, because unlike a Mexican of Argentinian he has no wave of tradion he rides on. Instead he can search the world over for what he wants to use as an influence, such as Thomas Bernhard.

Ana María Matute in El País

~ bythefirelight

Ana María Matute has a new book out and El País has given it a great review. If you have never read her work, she is definitely worth it. Her sparse short stories are excellent. Her name often comes up around Nobel time (although that may just be in Spain). If you are unfamiliar with her, the description from the article is a great synopsis.

Aunque perteneciente, cronológicamente, a la llamada generación del medio siglo, con cuyos más destacados miembros comparte determinados trasfondos temáticos (la Guerra Civil española, la desolación como paisaje moral de los años de posguerra, la rememoración de la infancia como irreparable pérdida de la inocencia edénica, y el descalabro humano reinante en una sociedad en la que los más débiles sucumben bajo la impiedad de los poderosos), la escritura de Ana María Matute siempre se ha regido por un talante despegado de las consignas tanto ideológicas como estéticas de la época.

Although she belongs, chronologically, to the mid century generation, whose most well know members share certain thematic overtones (the Spanish Civil Way, the desolation as moral voyage through the years after the war, the child’s memory as the irreparable loss of an Eden like innocence, and the reigning human misfortune in a society where the weakest succumb to the impunity of the powerful), the writing of Ana María Matute has always been marked by a talent not tied to ideologies but the aesthetics of the era.

New New Zealand Writing – Elizabeth Catton

~ bythefirelight

The Outing is just a brief story, no more than 1500 words, but it is a fun read with a dark and sharp humor. The story, in its briefness, naturally leaves much unsaid, but that briefness is just enough to lead the reader into the richest of questions, those that expand the story and are the logical outgrowth of well drawn characters. In the story, one of the characters takes great pride in telling pedophilia jokes. You don’t know much more about the character and as I put the story down I thought, what does this say about the character? It is that kind of opened question that makes the story more than just a series of jokes.

Amitav Ghosh On The CBC

~ bythefirelight

The Millions points to an Amitav Ghosh interview on the CBC. Considering I have just finished Sea of Poppies, it is well timed.

Year in Reading Hermano Cerdo Style

~ bythefirelight

Hermano Cerdo is publishing a year in reading much like the Million’s. It is in Spanish, of course, except the Diaz piece, but the most enteresting thing is how many of the readers mention English language books (not translations), not just Spanish Language books. This is a little different from the Millions and gives it an interesting feel.

Castellanos Moya on Words Without Borders

~ bythefirelight ~ 1 Comment

Words Without borders features a blog post by Horacio Castellanos Moya. In the post he describes the death threats he received after the publication of Revulsion: Thomas Bernhard in San Salvador and forced him to stay away from El Salvador for years.

Multi-Dimensional Chinese Poetry

~ bythefirelight

I’m still working my way through fascinating Su Hui poem, but it is an interesting idea.Written to be read left to right, right to left, up and down and diagonally, David Hinton has attempted to not only translate, but recreate the diagrammatic poem in English. This is a case where the translation looses something, not for the work of the translator, but because the two language systems are so different.

Kafka’s Workplace Writings

~ bythefirelight

When I think of reading something like Kafka’s workplace writings (he was in the insurance trade; how much more boring could it get)  I get the chills and think, thank goodness I’m not a literary scholar. I’m sure it has some value, but I’d rather hear a 30 minute interview give me a survey than read it. Maybe someday someone will want to analyze all the code I’ve written, if it still works…talk about ephemeral.

Amanda Michalopoulou in Context

~ bythefirelight

Dalkey Archive’s magazine Context has a good interview with Amanda Michalopoulou. She talks about I’d Like and it sounds as interesting as I have heard. I can’t wait to read it, although I have a couple more books lined up before it.  She said a couple of interesting things.

Characters are the vehicles of ideas, but they have to work as characters. If not, you’re writing theory, not literature. The idea behind the characters in this book is that family can be a mechanism of oppression. I guess all my characters feel very clearly that they are obeying other people’s wishes. Writing can be a true act of disobedience, so the desire the younger sister has to write these stories down is a step towards salvation. I believe that writing can and should do that: save characters who are suffering, and, possibly, their author as well.

And later

Helping people to be alone in a room, alone in the world, and yet surrounded by so many human beings inside their head. This is one of the greatest joys in life. And I say this as a reader now, not as a writer.

Translation as Nationalism

~ bythefirelight

Eurozine has an article called re-transnationalization of literary criticism. It is not a new article (although the danish translation is), but it is interesting especially in the American context. The article laments the passing of an age when major newspapers in Europe would publish reviews of books that had just been published in a different countries and in a different languages. The golden age of this nationalism free reviewing was the 50s. Now, some 50 years later the major papers only review translations of books written in other languages. Considering how few fiction titles are translated into English, less than 3% this year according to Three Percent, it seems like not just a lost age, but an age that never existed. It also seems the perfect reflection of the differences between the United States and Europe: one a large geographically isolated country for much of its history; the other, a group of states whose histories and geography are intertwined even if at times some states have not wanted to believe it.

Studs Terkel Has Passed Away

~ bythefirelight

Studs Terkel has passed away. The NY Times has an obituary. I always liked the work of Terkel since I first ran across him in college. I thought the Good War was the best of what I’d read. His interview with EB Sledge was impresive. Hard Times, since it was written at the end of the 60’s, has a perhaps unfortunate way of being a comment on the 60’s themselves. I suppose no oral history can not be a reflection of the times it is given in.

New Arabic Literature

~ bythefirelight

Literary Salon has a nice write up of an interesting link to a new book on modern Arabic literature. It sounds interesting and has great promise.

When I was reading the article I went to the publisher’s site and if you are interested in Arabic literature the next year has some promissing offerings. I think the volume on post modern arabic literature looks the most intreging. Give Saqi Books a look if you are interested.