��by Mercè Rodoreda, translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent

I’ve always enjoyed knowing what happens to people. It’s not because I’m garrulous but because I like people, and I was fond of the owners of this house. But all of this happened so long ago that I can no longer recall many of the details. I’m old, and sometimes I get mixed up.

There was no need to go to the Excelsior to see films the summers they came with their friends. There was this one fellow who liked to paint the sea, Feliu Roca he was called. His work had been shown in exhibitions in Paris, and I believe he’s known in Barcelona and made a pile of money with his swathes of blue. He had painted the sea in all of its incarnations: calm, wild, big waves, small waves. Green, the color of fear. Grey, the color of clouds. Seascapes. He said he did seascapes, and his friends encouraged him to dapple the canvas because that’s what Americans like. They made fun of him and would say too many painters had painted the sea already; and then the young man, a good-looking fellow with ash blond hair and sleepy blue eyes . . . He stuttered sometimes. Such as when the colors didn’t come out the way he wanted them. I’m referring to the paint mixture. And he would say to me: it’s more difficult to paint this beast of blue than to tend flowers. And I would answer: you’re right, yes you are. Flowers grow all by themselves. Maybe that’s why there’s so little merit in being a gardener. I said it just to make him happy, and he said that when he finished painting the sea in every possible state of seaness, he would paint me, sitting in the sun. I didn’t believe him. No. Every summer, when he came up, I was glad to see him again and I think he was glad to see me too. Six summers . . . all told, six summers and one terrible winter.

One of his female friends—there were two of them and they always came—was named Eulàlia. The other was Maragda. This Maragda was a seamstress and had been Senyoreta Rosamaria’s boss when Rosamaria had worked for her as a young girl; that’s how they became friends. When they returned from their morning swim, I always tried to busy myself with the nearby flowerbeds, the one that’s full of marigolds in particular, so I could hear them talking. Such gaiety and youth, so much money . . . so much of everything . . . and two wrecked lives. I once saw a bird that let itself die. It must have been a desperate bird, desperate like Eugeni.

*

The first time I met the masters, the Senyorets, was in early spring, shortly after they were married. I knew the gentleman from before. I had seen him twice, once when he visited the estate with the intention of buying it, the other when he came to oversee the progress of the renovations. That second time he told me he would like me to stay, it suited him fine to keep me on as the gardener. They were to honeymoon abroad and were only stopping here for a short visit. Lots of strolls and time spent on the belvedere gazing at the ebb and flow of the waves, at the sky and all the movement within it, standing close to one another, sometimes holding each other. If ever I approached them during the day, I always coughed to make my presence known; it’s no sin for a married couple to embrace, and yet I thought they wouldn’t want to be seen. Quima, the cook, was already there that year. And after that they hired her every summer because the cook they had in Barcelona went home to her family. Quima made me tell her everything they did in the garden, and she told me everything that happened around the house. She got a lot of it from one of the maids, Miranda, a Brazilian girl. This Miranda wore a black dress, so formfitting on her snake-thin body that she would have been better off not wearing anything at all. And an apron of lace no larger than your hand. She thought she was something special. But there wasn’t much for Quima to report because nothing much happened. Sometimes Senyoret Francesc would slip an olive into Senyoreta Rosamaria’s mouth and she would take it with her little teeth. Apparently he was crazy about her. Quima said that when Miranda was telling her this, she, Miranda that is, who was the color of licorice, went pale. With envy, Quima said. These girls from Brazil are like that, it seems. One day they went out for a ride in the car and Quima took me upstairs. I was afraid they would come back and catch us. She said: “Wait till you see the jewelry she has! Senyoret Francesc is one of the wealthiest men in Barcelona!” And she showed me lots of baubles, all diamonds she said, and a necklace with a teardrop pendant dangling in the middle. Rich folks, they were, really rich. And trusting. Through the slats in the blinds we looked out at the garden. The grounds that came with the villa, and the adjacent lands, were fields of grass and weeds back then, teeming with lizards.

They left, saying they would be back in June with some friends. They handed me the keys and left me in charge of the house, which I was to air out from time to time. I was very pleased when I received the letter announcing their return. And just as they had instructed, I hired Quima for the summer, and her face flushed with delight because Senyoret Francesc mentioned in his letter that he especially liked her oven-baked sole. Miranda arrived with her huge suitcases two or three days before the rest of the family, and never opened her mouth. I headed outside to my plants. She, to the dust indoors. They came by sea. Three days later we heard a horn and I caught sight of the boat right away, coming in slowly, and when it was close enough they lowered the outboard. They stayed on the beach because they were already in their ; they swam, and one of the friends began to on the water like a little figurine. They had brought an instructor to teach them, the skiing part I mean, and Senyoreta Rosamaria, just for laughs, asked me if I would like to learn myself, but I said . She asked if any of the flowers was ill, and I said I was glad to report they were all in fine health. They took on a new maid, Mariona, a village girl I knew by sight, very young, small and smooth as a pebble.

At night, from the mulberry and linden tree promenade, I would often find myself looking up at the masters’ bedroom window. I have always enjoyed walking in the garden at night, to feel it breathe. And when I grew tired I would amble back to my little house, reveling in the peaceful existence of all that was green and filled with color in the light of day. Gradually I became aware that someone else was often in the garden at that late hour. I concealed myself and stood watch, and I saw it was Miranda. I was annoyed because she held a branch in her hand and was beating my plants with it as she walked. One night I came out of the shadows and gave her a piece of my mind.

“Miranda?” Quima said one day. “I don’t like her. People who are awake during sleeping hours shouldn’t be trusted. What Miranda is really after . . . but clearly Senyoret has eyes for only one thing. I don’t think Senyoreta Rosamaria has any cause for concern.”

“Some men are attracted to people from faraway places, so they can dream of exotic trees and colorful feathers,” I said. “It suits them better.” Quima said I was off my rocker and threatened never to speak to me again. I wasn’t so crazy after all. Miranda played the innocent and went about laying her snares.

For a long time I knew very little about Senyoreta Eulàlia, the one who knew how to skate across the sea. Pale of skin and dark of hair, there was a reserved air about her. She was nothing like our Senyoreta, who radiated something that was like fair weather. For a while I suspected Feliu, the painter, was sweet on Eulàlia. But he was caught up in his painting. One day I teased him about it, and he said he wasn’t attracted to ladies who put on airs, and the task of entertaining them should fall to someone else, and rather than a bouquet of roses he much preferred a bunch of . . . he pointed to some flowers. “Foxglove,” I said. “A simple flower.” And he said: “If I’m not careful, there are ladies who would devour me alive, and the painter would be finished before ever getting started.”

I don’t know if he was right, and he probably didn’t either, but we both laughed. Now and again Quima would ask me what Miranda did at night.

“Nothing. She wanders about. As long as she doesn’t harm my plants she can do as she pleases.”

One moon-filled night she went for a swim. I wouldn’t have recognized her if it hadn’t been for the moon. She sprinted into the water as if entering a sea of ink. And when she emerged she gleamed like an olive. She stretched out on the sand and she lay there for so long I thought she had fallen asleep. And swoosh, swoosh, swoosh went the water, here I come and there I go. I mimicked the frog’s call and Miranda didn’t move. Still as death. I finally tired of singing and went home to bed. And just as I was falling asleep: croak, croak, croak beneath my window. I could have strangled her. I pretended to be asleep and I have resented her ever since.

by Mercè Rodoreda, translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent (Spain, Open Letter)

My first (and possibly strongest) argument why War, So Much War should win the Best Translated Book Award is that Mercè Rodoreda is symbolic of the importance of translated literature. The Catalan language—a language banished under the Franco regime and during the bulk of Rodoreda’s writing career—is today spoken by a mere nine million people. That may seem like a lot but, comparatively, it’s only the size of a large city, say Mexico City or New York. It is a language that has survived against the odds. Rodoreda was an author who wrote in a prohibited language and almost exclusively in exile. Imagine leaving your home and writing in a language Franco had called the language of dogs. And yet the book. The book. How often do you read a book and feel that it’s essential? That it always existed and you just had to find it?

War, So Much War seduces with its apparent simplicity until the reader realizes something rather brilliant and rare is taking place. It has one foot in the world of the living and another in a fever dream. The premise is simple: a young boy runs away from home during the Spanish Civil War (although the name of the war is never mentioned). The chapters are short and the novel is episodic. The world of war, its strange and surreal cruelty, is seen through the eyes of the boy as he tramps through the countryside. Strangers come in and out of focus, some longer than others. I read War, So Much War just after finishing Don Quixote and the similarities are hard to ignore: it’s a pastoral and episodic novel. Each tiny chapter moves the story forward by small increments. The tones are very different of course but the similarities are pronounced.

Translated by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent the language of the novel is never less than stunning. A passage where the young protagonist listens to an old man imprisoned in an empty castle is especially memorable. The old man rambles as the boy listens:

Observe and admire the perfect order of stars, the passing of time with its retinue of seasons: the gates of summer, the gates of winter. Observe the waves, attend to the grandeur of the winds that the angels blow from the four corners of the pulsating heavens. The lightning that streaks everything with fire, the crawling thunder . . . I adored rosy cheeks, turgid buttocks, honey-sweet breasts, dawn-colored thighs, snow-white, nacreous feet . . . Books that impart wisdom, blazing sunsets from my windows, the pearly light of the night star. My life had been a perfect jewel, a diamond. What are my broken bones but a way of binding me to the realm of memories, to everything I once had and still retain because it dwells in the darkest recesses of my heart?

For a book with War in the title (twice!) there is very little war. War is present, but often in the distance or on the periphery. Instinctively the reader knows bad and violent things are taking place nearby, perhaps over the next hill or in the neighboring valley, but the violence is mostly off-screen. The effects of war, however, the way war changes how people live in, feel and perceive the world, especially children, is omnipotent. This is another reason why War, So Much War is so relevant and universal. War and its ravaging effects are, unfortunately, timeless. Though written toward the end of her life, in 1980, the novel, like all great novels, feels immune to trends.

I could say a lot more about this novel. How customers who have purchased War, So Much War have returned to Brazos Bookstore to not only thank us for the recommendation but to ask: ‘what other books do you have by her?’ How I think a posthumous Nobel Prize she should be awarded to Rodoreda. How the Book Group is reading The Time of the Doves in May and I couldn’t be more excited. Her titles are not only selling well but being talked about in, of all places, Houston, Texas. And in the year 2016. Yes, the mere fact that this brilliant writer and her amazing book is being discussed in 2016 for its literary merit, its translation and its timelessness is a cause for celebration. Mercè Rodoreda is the writer I never knew I needed until I’d read her.

The gender disparity in terms of women in translation has been fairly well documented—see the tumblr and all of the work has been doing—but it’s worth reiterating some of the primary numbers.

Using our own Translation Database, I calculated that between 2008 and 2014 only 26.6% of all the works of fiction and poetry published in translation were written by women. That’s pretty damn appalling.

I still might be missing some 2015 titles, but at this moment, I have logged in 552 original works of fiction and poetry in translation, 165 written by women. I don’t think this is a reason to celebrate, but at 29.9%, that is a slight uptick over the average . . .

Leaving off all of the books by women that I included on my previous lists (post listing all lists is forthcoming), and ones that I’m planning on including in the future (this will never end!), here are seven books by women from 2015 that are worth reading.

by Naja Marie Aidt, translated from the Danish by K. E. Semmel (Open Letter)

Given that this is the first Open Letter book I’ve included on these lists, I hope everyone reading this can acknowledge that I’m doing my best to include as many different presses, writers, translators as possible, and not just promoting the mind-blowingly amazing books that we’ve been bringing out.

This is Naja’s first novel and her second book to be translated into English. (The first, Baboon, translated by Denise Newman, won the PEN Translation Prize last year.) It’s a book I considered including on the “noir” list that’s forthcoming, but with all the competition for that—do you have any idea how many crime titles are published every year?—I thought it would make more sense to include her here.

Rock, Paper, Scissors centers around Thomas, a stationery-store owner whose dad dies in prison. Going through some of his belongings, Thomas discovers a mysterious package that could radically change his family’s fortunes. But as the book develops, more and more awful things start happening to him . . .

You can find out more about Naja by reading

by Marianne Fritz, translated from the Germany by Adrian Nathan West (Dorothy Project)

(What’s below appeared verbatim in an earlier post, but I have nothing new to add.)

This may well be the most intriguing jacket copy I’ve read in a while.

The Weight of Things is the first book, and the first translated book, and possibly the only translatable book by Austrian writer Marianne Fritz (1948–2007). For after winning acclaim with this novel—awarded the Robert Walser Prize in 1978—she embarked on a 10,000-page literary project called “The Fortress,” creating over her lifetime elaborate, colorful diagrams and typescripts so complicated that her publisher had to print them straight from her original documents. A project as brilliant as it is ambitious and as bizarre as it is brilliant, it earned her cult status, comparisons to James Joyce no less than Henry Darger, and admirers including Elfriede Jelinek and W. G. Sebald.

My knee-jerk reaction when I see something referred to as “untranslatable” is to cry Nonsense! and bust out all sort of practical versus theoretical reasons why everything’s translatable, just maybe not in the way the speaker has in mind.

But then I Googled Marianne Fritz’s later works and found this:

Yep. That. Amazing.

by Alisa Ganieva, translated from the Russian by Carol Apollonio (Deep Vellum)

We have a full review of this forthcoming, so I won’t say too much here. Basically this is a genre-bending novel about what happens when rumors spread that the Russian government is going to erect a wall to block off the Caucasus republics from the rest of the country. (Shades of Trump!) It’s also one of the only (the only?) book from Dagestan to be published in English translation.

Not too many months ago, I listened to the audiobook recording of Masha Gessen’s The Brothers about the Boston Bombers. It also involves a lot about Dagestan and I totally fell in love with the way the reader pronounced “Makhachkala.” Weirdly, that got me interested in this book . . . Sometimes the way we find things to read is so random.

by Laura Restrepo, translated from the Spanish by Ernest Mestre-Reed (AmazonCrossing)

I just got a copy of this and hope to read it over the holiday break. (Although I’ll probably spend most of my vacation reading out 2016 titles and prepping for my world lit class . . . sigh. There’s just not enough time for pleasure reading anymore.) Anyway, Restrepo is one of those “AmazonCrossing coups” that I’ve mentioned in past articles and interviews. Sure, a lot of what Amazon does are genre books, romances, thrillers, etc., but they also do a handful of big name literary authors who have been overlooked by more established publishers. Such as Restrepo.

You might remember Restrepo from last summer’s Women’s World Cup of Literature where her novel, Delirium, lost in the semifinals to Alina Bronsky’s The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine.

Hot Sur is a more recent novel that sounds dark and edgy:

María Paz is a young Latin American woman who, like many others, has come to America chasing a dream. When she is accused of murdering her husband and sentenced to life behind bars, she must struggle to keep hope alive as she works to prove her innocence. But the dangers of prison are not her only obstacles: gaining freedom would mean facing an even greater horror lying in wait outside the prison gates, one that will stop at nothing to get her back.

This is one of those titles that I have a feeling certain booksellers would be rallying around had it come out from someone else. Which makes me feel bad for the book.

by Mercè Rodoreda, translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent (Open Letter)

This book made and since I can’t resist the idea of having lists inside of lists (inside of lists inside of . . . ), I’m just going to quote from his write up:

War, So Much War, the latest translation of her work following volumes of short stories and the darkly sublime novel Death in Spring, is a phantasmagorical journey through a landscape of war. People disappear into the sea. Cat men made out of broken parts try to make their way in the world. A kind of anti-picturesque episodic adventure, the novel makes sense of war through the nonreal, makes us understand that in the worst circumstances the surreal is the every-day as well as the place people escape to because there is nowhere else to hide.

This book has been getting some great year-end play from booksellers and other critics. As one of my all-time favorite writers, I couldn’t be happier. Go Rodoreda! (Now if only I could find a way to learn more about Catalan culture . . . like by attending the Barcelona-Arsenal Champions League match in mid-March at Camp Nou . . . Maybe I should start a “gofundme” for this! “Send me to see some fútbol, I’ll bring back some Catalan lit!”)

by Ludmila Ulitskaya, translated from the Russian by Bela Shayevich (FSG)

I really like when Jonathan Sturgeon is given the space to write longer pieces about books for Flavorwire. He’s a very insightful, thoughtful, well-read critic, as can be evidenced in about Ulitskaya’s latest:

Because the novel is flat and fast, it’s difficult to describe the next several hundred pages. I’d rather given you an example of how it reads. But first I will say that it does not just dutifully work out the fates of our three young men, their sexualities, marriages, educations, occupations, travels, interpersonal struggles, and deaths; rather, it undutifully resolves these things. The plot meanders. The narrator ice skates along the novel’s surface. And as the book expands, it does become a big (green) tent, one that deals the fates of assorted minor characters, of what the narrator bafflingly calls “C-list extras.” The problem, though, is that any extra would be thrilled to be on the C-list; accordingly, the novel’s minor characters are always clambering in the limelight. (“Vera Samuilovna was crazy about endocrinology,” for instance.) Sometimes they ruin the shot.

Still, the book is often a joy to read. It is, if you will, crack. (Reminder: crack is bad for you.) But at least it is book crack and not TV crack. By this I do not mean that books are better than TV, although this is something I do believe. (I write about books.) What I mean is that The Big Green Tent, unlike some other big works of realism published this year, does not rely too much on TV tropes. Instead, it wins the reader’s attention with narrative art and (sometimes) ingenious language.

I considered including this in my spring class, but asking students to read a 570-page book in a week is begging for a student rebellion.

by Regina Ullmann, translated from the German by Kurt Beals (New Directions)

I don’t remember seeing a lot of coverage for this book when it first came out, which is both strange and disappointing. Her writing is weird in that way that a lot of literary readers and reviewers seem to enjoy. Robert Musil called her a “genius.” There are blurbs on the book jacket by Rainer Maria Rilke, Thomas Mann, and Hermann Hesse. Kurt Beals won a PEN Heim Translation Award for this. And here’s the opening of the title story:

Summer, but a younger summer than this one; the summer back then was no more than my equal in years. True, I still wasn’t happy, not happy to my core, but I had to be int he way that everyone is. The sun set me ablaze. It grazed on the green knoll where I sat, a knoll with an almost sacred form, where I had taken refuge from the dust of the country road. Because I was weary. I was weary because I was alone. This long country road before and behind me . . . The bends that it made around this knoll, the poplars—even heaven itself could not relieve it of its bleakness. I was ill at ease, because just a short way into my walk, this road had already dragged me into its misery and squalor. It was an uncanny country road. An all-knowing road. A road reserved for those who had been, in some way, left alone.

*

So go forth and read women in translation!