There are still many places around the world where linguistic minorities are persecuted and do not have the same access to work, education, health care or justice. Where I was born, the original Welsh Language Act had been in force…
International Translation Day 2014: Language Rights are Human Rights
Tagged with: human rights, International Translation Day, Language, linguistic rights, PEN, Sami, Translation, Welsh
Posted in international, translation
Posted in international, translation
Banned Books Week: Censored! Pippi and Tintin
This week (21-27 September) is Banned Books Week. It’s a chance – particularly in the States – to celebrate the freedom to read. What gets banned isn’t always what you expect, and it’s very contextual. In this regard, the Finnish Library Channel’s calendar…
Tagged with: banned Books Week, Belgian, Bible, Finnish, French, Pippi Longstocking, Russian, Swedish, Tintin
Posted in Banned Books Week, books, international
Posted in Banned Books Week, books, international
Scotland: “If only hitting on the right judgment/were instinctive to humankind!”
Today Scotland votes on independence. As a Welsh neighbour who lived in Scotland for half a decade, I’d love to be voting, but it’s not for me to decide. It’s still a good day to read some Scottish Gaelic poetry, though.…
Tagged with: An Tuil/The Flood, Book of the Dean of Lismore, Gaelic, German, Katherine Whyte Grant, Meg Bateman, Poetry, Ronald Black, Scotland, Scottish Referendum, Translation
Posted in books, international, literature, poetry, Scotland Referendum, translation
Posted in books, international, literature, poetry, Scotland Referendum, translation
25 years – that’s a quarter of a century…
In just a few weeks time, it will be 25 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. That’s a quarter of a century… makes a girl think. If you, too, wear glasses from reading too much small print, you will…
Tagged with: 1989, Art Spiegelman, Arundhati Roy, Atonement, Central Europe, Christina Viragh, Czesław Miłosz, German, God of Small Things, Hungarian, IanMcEwan, Kertész Imre, Literature, Maus, Nobel Prize, Poetry, Polish, quarter of a century, Tim Wilkinson, Wisława Szymborska, World Literature Today
Posted in history, international, literature, poetry, translation
Posted in history, international, literature, poetry, translation
Williams translating Williams
Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has a new book of poems out this month, first presented at the Edinburgh Book Festival, where I got my hands on a copy. The Other Mountain, published by Carcanet, includes a couple of…
Tagged with: books, Edinburgh Book Festival, Literature, Poetry, Rowan Williams, The Other Mountain, Translation, Waldo Williams, Wales, Welsh
Posted in books, Edinburgh Festival, faith, literature, poetry, translation, Uncategorized
Posted in books, Edinburgh Festival, faith, literature, poetry, translation, Uncategorized
keeping the language alive: polari, manx, cornish
When I was a teenager in Cardiff, the family next door spoke Welsh, but most people around spoke English. When I went to babysit, the boys were in shock: how could this other person speak their home language too? They…
Tagged with: Cornish, Endangered Languages Project, English, Gaelic, Manx, Mick Paynter, Morrissey, Ned Maddrell, Polari, Welsh
Posted in international, translation, words
Posted in international, translation, words
as red as blood
In preparation for my next Finnish exam, I’ve been devouring teen literature; the action is usually breathless enough to compensate for my slower reading pace. But when I went to take Ilkka Auer’s Ice-Witch ones back and get As Red…
Tagged with: As Red As Blood, books, Fantasy, Finnish, Ilkka Auer, Literature, Owen Witesman, Salla Simukka, Snow White, Translation
Posted in books, translation
Posted in books, translation
freedom is the best thing: Tove is 100!
Tove Jansson was born 100 years ago today. If you live in Finland, you won’t have missed the anniversary Moomin mugs (with donations to UNICEF), the large and splendid retrospective of her work at the Ateneum national art gallery, or the…
Tagged with: Ateneum, Finnish, ICA, Moomins, Tove Jansson, Tuula Karjalainen, Work and Love
Posted in books, Illustration, international, literature, Tove Jansson Centenary, translation
Posted in books, Illustration, international, literature, Tove Jansson Centenary, translation
stories from home: books for unaccompanied migrant children
Reading stories in translation opens up the world to places you could never go to. For some people however, the place they can never go to is back home. More and more children are migrating into the US from Latin…
found in translation 