Every day, the queue gets longer. More and more people need documents: profound of citizenship, exemptions, permissions, documents with forms to get the other documents for the other forms. So they come to the Gate, and wait. They wait in…
The Queue
Tagged with: Arabic, Basma Abdel Aziz, books, Egypt, Elisabeth Jaquette, The Queue, Translation
Posted in books, literature, translation
Posted in books, literature, translation
Mascha Kaléko: a new bilingual edition
This new and fully bilingual edition of the Poems of Mascha Kaléko, out in time for the 110th anniversary of her birth, is a good introduction in English to one of my favourite German poets, who deserves to be more…
Tagged with: Andreas Nolte, books, Fomite Press, Gabriele Münter, German, Mascha Kaléko, Poetry, The Poems of Mascha Kaléko, Translation
Posted in books, poetry, translation
Posted in books, poetry, translation
Finland 100: Minna Canth
This beautiful book (cover design by Anu Tuominen) is one of 12 classics republished by WSOY to celebrate Finland’s 100th anniversary. Minna Canth, the author of Työmiehen vaimo/The worker’s wife, died 120 years ago this Friday, so she didn’t live to…
Tagged with: Anu Tuominen, Finland 100, Finnish, Minna Canth, theatre, Translation, Työmiehen vaimo, WSOY
Posted in books, Finland 100, theatre, translation
Posted in books, Finland 100, theatre, translation
The Proof
Mostly, I’m just really glad I’m not sixteen any more. The crushing insecurity then is exacerbated by 24/7 bullying on social media now – not to mention the knife crime, the violence, who’d want it? Marcia doesn’t seem to like it much…
Tagged with: And Other Stories, Argentina, Buenos Aires, César Aira, Mao (not that one), Nick Caistor, PEN Translation Prize, Short Story Project, Spanish, The Proof, Translation
Posted in books, translation
Posted in books, translation
Finland 100: Edith Södergran
It is spring. The earth is bare, the snow is melting. The nights are cold, but the sun is getting stronger, the days are getting longer, a lot longer. Takatalvi (“back-winter” – the reverse of an Indian summer) might strike at…
Tagged with: Aale Tynni, David Barrett, Edith Södergran, Finland, Finland 100, Pentti Saaritsa, Poetry, Swedish, Uuno Kaila
Posted in books, Finland 100, poetry, translation
Posted in books, Finland 100, poetry, translation
Iza’s Ballad
This one is desperately sad, and it stays with you. The Door should have prepared me for more the direct emotion, the weight of history, the unflinching look at how the characters – people more like you and me than we’d care…
Tagged with: books, Budapest, George Szirtes, Hungarian, Iza's Ballad, Magda Szabo, mothers and daughters, Translation
Posted in books, gender, history, translation
Posted in books, gender, history, translation
Memoirs of a polar bear
A decade ago, on a visit to Berlin, I bought a small Steiff bear to remind me of the city I used to live in, and of Knut. Knut, if you don’t know already, was a baby polar bear in Berlin Zoo.…
Tagged with: Berlin, books, German, Memoirs of a Polar Bear, Susan Bernofsky, Translation, Yoko Tawada
Posted in books, gender, translation
Posted in books, gender, translation
