Globalization of Latin American Writers.

Adam Critchley interviews Mexican author Álvaro Enrigue about “his conviction that translated work is finding a widening world audience,” and there’s plenty of interesting stuff, beginning with this:

I think there has been a change in perspective among readers, both in the US and the UK, regarding the notion of translation.

I think reading a work in translation used to be seen as reading a “false” book, but the new generation has modified that outlook, and this is not simply due to a renewal of readers but of editors. We’re seeing a new generation of editors, who now tend to be younger than writers. And many of these young editors are women, and that has introduced an aspect to the market reflected in seeing more translations read.

I’m glad to hear it! But the next paragraph showed me an abyss of ignorance in my own head that I had been unaware of:

There was also an impressive shift from the 20th to the 21st century in the quality of translations. I moved to the US in 1998 and in those days if you wanted to read Spanish-language writers in translation the only options were [the Spaniards] Enrique Vila-Matas and Javier Marías. There was absolutely nothing else. But now a writer under the age of 30 who publishes a decent novel in Mexico or Peru, for example, can find a publisher in the US or the UK.

I still had the idea, left over from the ’60s and ’70s, that Latin American writing was a big thing in the US — el boom, ¿no? Turns out el boom was a long time ago… (Thanks, Trevor!)

Comments

  1. I think we have to interpret the remark about reading Spanish-language writers in translation as being about reading trendy Spanish-language writers. Certainly Spanish-language writers are available in English from Cervantes onwards, and el boom‘s writers have by no means gone out of print. Indeed, Vila-Matas was born in 1948 and wrote his first book in 1971, but didn’t become well-known until 1985 — still a long time ago.

  2. Ah, that makes sense. Thanks for ensmallening the vacancy in my head!

  3. Off-topic: have you seen this article about the sad story of Russian Harry Potter translations?

  4. I had not; thanks for that! Here‘s Google Translate for those who don’t read Russian.

  5. Well, sort of: one gathers the intent behind ‘The sixth book, “the Deathly Hallows”, initially announced as “Deathly Hallows,” and then the name had to be changed to the “Deathly Hallows” (one name was completely unclear what it was about)’, but one would like to know exactly what was wrong the first time.
    I was also amused by GT’s work on the names of some of the translators. Most remained intact, perhaps because they are named in some bilingual corpus somewhere, or simply because their surnames are opaque, but the others became Igor Orange (Oransky), Vladimir Grandmother (Babkov), and Leonid Moth (Motylev)!

    As for the article itself, the insight that the francophone reader will tend to see the bad guys as French (because they have Anglo-French surnames like Malfoy and Lestrange, which are modernized in the French translation) is a good one.

  6. Well, sort of: one gathers the intent behind ‘The sixth book, “the Deathly Hallows”, initially announced as “Deathly Hallows,” and then the name had to be changed to the “Deathly Hallows” (one name was completely unclear what it was about)’, but one would like to know exactly what was wrong the first time.

    Heh. The original is “Шестая книга, «Deathly Hallows», вначале анонсировалась как «Роковые мощи», а потом название пришлось менять на «Дары смерти» (по одному названию было совершенно непонятно, о чем речь),” which translates to “The sixth book, Deathly Hallows, was initially announced as Fateful Relics, but then the name had to be changed to The Gifts of Death (just from the name it was completely unclear what it was about).”

  7. I recall that when the name of the seventh book was announced, there was a lot of wondering what “deathly hallows” was supposed to mean even in English.

    I also assumed that giving so many of the villains French-sounding names was an intentional stylistic decision by Rowling.

  8. Well, as it says in the article, those names are meant to evoke the image of posh Anglo-Norman families. “Bad Normans” is a trope that goes back at least to Walter Scott.

  9. @John Cowan: the correct translation would of course be Igor of Orange.

  10. I also assumed that giving so many of the villains French-sounding names was an intentional stylistic decision by Rowling.

    Sure, but they are meant to be very English nonetheless, and when they become Malfoi and L’Estrange in a French context, they probably don’t look at all English to the francophone reader any more.

  11. Well, sort of: one gathers the intent behind ‘The sixth book, “the Deathly Hallows”, initially announced as “Deathly Hallows,” and then the name had to be changed to the “Deathly Hallows” (one name was completely unclear what it was about)’, but one would like to know exactly what was wrong the first time.

    Well, the definite article, obviously–they don’t use those in Russian. Damned silly of the translators to have forgotten that.

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