This week’s music is “Simulation Swarm” by Big Thief.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on

You can watch next week’s episode (June 22nd, 9am ET) which will cover through page 136 in Never Did the Fire and page 152 in Catching Fire live on YouTube , and watch all previous seasons on ourÌý.

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

The associated with this post is copyrighted by .

This week’s music is “It Was Us” by Arms and Sleepers.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on

You can watch next week’s episode (June 1st) live on YouTube , and watch all previous seasons on ourÌý.

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

This week’s music is “Monday” by The Regrettes.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on

You can watch next week’s episode (June 1st) live on YouTube , and watch all previous seasons on ourÌý.

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

Katie, Brian, and Chad will be back live on May 25th to cover up to page 68 inÌýNever Did the FireÌýand to page 78 inÌýCatching Fire.

This week’s music is “No Blade of Grass” from the new(ish) Bodega album.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

This week’s music is “Age of Anxietyt I” from the new Arcade Fire album.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on

Also: use code 2MONTHREVIEW at the for 10% off everything. (Lies! Discount only applies to books—no bundles, no tote bags, etc.)

Next week’s episode will be available on 5/14 to Patreon supporters, and will drop wherever you get your podcasts on Wednesday, May 18th. Unlike other episodes, it’ll consist of two interviews related to Eltit and the books rather than a breakdown of the next sections. We’ll be back to normal on May 25th!

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

In this episode, they contextualize Eltit and this particular book, talk about intentional ambiguity, Franco and Pinochet, action vs. analysis, bad and hard to eat rice, and more.

Also, Katie sings.

This week’s music is “Impossible” from the new Röyksopp album.

If you like what you hear, review, rate, and support us on Patreon!

Also: use code 2MONTHREVIEW at the for 10% off everything.

You can watch next week’s episode (May 11th) live on YouTubeÌý, and watch all previous seasons on ourÌý.

¹ó´Ç±ô±ô´Ç·ÉÌýÌýÌýandÌýÌýfor random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

Be sure to order Brian’s book,Ìý, which is available at better bookstores everywhere thanks to BOA Editions. And all of Katie’s translations, especiallyÌýÌý,Ìýand her forthcomingÌý

Large image associated with this post copyrighted by .

Before getting into the books for this season, we have a couple of announcements. First off, we now have a , so please please follow us.

Also, following the trend of podcasts everywhere, we’ve launched a with some really fun bonuses for supporters, including access to a Discord channel, a book from my personal library, merchandise, a chance to vote on future seasons, and an opportunity to come on an episode. The funds from this will go to get Brian and Katie microphones, help support them for doing this every week, and, if all goes well, we’ll be able to put on a special TMR event/party this fall. Thanks in advance for your support, and we promise it’ll be worth your while.

Now, on to the books!

Many of you will recognize the manÌý (or his hands?) in the photo to the left as Daniel Hahn, translator, writer, editor, critic, and literary citizen extraordinaire, who was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2020, won the International Foreign Fiction Prize in 2007 (for José Eduardo Agualusa’sÌýThe Book of Chameleons) and the International Dublin Literary Award in 2017 (again for an Agualusa book,ÌýA General Theory of Oblivion), and set up the Translators Association First Translation Prize. He was the national program director for the British Centre for Literary Translation, teaches workshops and seminars on a very regular basis, and is affiliated with every great translator-centric organization.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg! Seriously, Danny is one of a kind, a true ambassador for international literature, and one of the nicest and most talented translators out there. If you ever have a chance to meet him, or watch him on a panel, or attend one of his workshops—do it!

There are any number of books Danny’s translated that would be great for the podcast (like the bio of Arsène Wenger perhaps?! Go Gunners!), but this two-book package that just came out from Charco Press is IDEAL.

When Danny agreed to translateÌýÌýby Diamela Eltit, he also agreed to write a “translator’s diary”‘ on Charco’s site about the experience, giving readers the opportunity to get a glimpse behind the curtain as he worked his way through this quite experimental novel. That blog became Catching Fire, which came out at the same time as the Eltit, and is the perfect companion piece for this season.

So, instead of reading one difficult book, we’re going to try an experiment and read both ÌýandÌýÌýsimultaneously. There isn’t a one-to-one correspondence between the novel and Danny’s diary, but I think that we’ll be able to bounce ideas off of the two texts in a very interesting way. Also, given that these books are relatively short, the per-week reading burden for this season is quite low . . . Which is good, because I’ve tried to read Eltit several times in the past and . . . her work was way beyond my comprehension at the time.

That said,Ìý sounds right up my alley:

A literary icon in Chile and a major figure in the anti-Pinochet resistance, Diamela Eltit gets renewed attention in the English language in a novel of breakdowns. Holed up together, old, ill, and untethered from the revolutionary action that defined them, a couple’s bonds dissolve in their loss of a child and their loss of belief in an idea. What is there left to have faith in when the structures we built, and the ones we succumbed to, no longer offer us any comfort or prospect of salvation?

There are four other Eltit books available in English translation: Sacred Cow, translated by Amanda Hopkinson (Serpent’s Tail, 1995),ÌýThe Fourth World, translated by Dick Gerdes (University of Nebraska, 1995), E. Luminata, translated by Ronald Christ (Lumen Books, 1997), and Custody of the Eyes, translated by Helen Lane and Ronald Christ (Lumen Books, 2005). She’s received a number of big prizes over the course of her career, including, most recently, the Chilean National Prize for Literature (2018), Carlos Fuentes Prize (2020), and the FIL Award (2021).

I don’t know much more about her, although I’ve always thought of her as a true cult author—one who has had a large influence on the more avant-garde writers, such as Mónica Ramón Ríos and Carlos Labbe. Which is why I’m particularly excited to dig into this. Katie and Brian will explain Eltit to me, I’ll get to learn a lot about an author I feel like I should really love, and we get to talk to and about one of my favorite translation people.

So here’s the schedule! (Dates are for the live , the audio will be available approximately a day later.)

:ÌýÌýNever Did the FireÌý1-20;ÌýCatching FireÌý1-24

:ÌýNFÌý21-44;ÌýCF 25-52

: Bonus Episode

: NFÌý45-68; CF 53-78

: NFÌý69-90; CF 79-105

June 8: NF 91-108; CFÌýÌý106-130

June 15: NF 109-136; CF 131-154

June 22: NFÌý137-156; CF 155-186

Get your copies now, and get ready! And if you like what we’ve done in the past, please consider supporting us through our .