{"id":296656,"date":"2014-02-25T14:44:43","date_gmt":"2014-02-25T14:44:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wdev.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent-dev\/2014\/02\/25\/elizabeth-harris-tells-us-why-translation-makes-all-the-difference\/"},"modified":"2018-04-16T15:44:26","modified_gmt":"2018-04-16T15:44:26","slug":"elizabeth-harris-tells-us-why-translation-makes-all-the-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/2014\/02\/25\/elizabeth-harris-tells-us-why-translation-makes-all-the-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Elizabeth Harris Tells Us Why Translation Makes All the Difference"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elizabeth Harris has translated fiction by Mario Rigoni Stern, Fabio Stassi, and Marco Candida, among others. Her translation of Giulio Mozzi\u2019s story collection Questo \u00e8 il giardino (This Is the Garden)<\/strong> will be published by Open Letter Books in 2014; the individual stories have appeared in The Literary Review<\/a>, The Missouri Review<\/a>, The Kenyon Review<\/a>, AGNI<\/span><\/a>, Words Without Borders<\/a>, and elsewhere. Her translation of Mozzi\u2019s \u201cCarlo Doesn\u2019t Know How to Read\u201d appears in Dalkey Archive\u2019s annual anthology Best European Fiction 2010<\/strong>, and her translation of an excerpt of Candida\u2019s Dream Diary<\/strong> appears in Best European Fiction 2011<\/strong>. She teaches creative writing at the University of North Dakota.<\/i><\/p>\n

When a fiction translator really knows her job, the resulting book in English\u2014if the original author is good enough\u2014shines. You might have a spectacular work of fiction in the original, but if the translator isn\u2019t up to it, that book will be lackluster in English. The translation, people will say, is clumsy, because it\u2019s noticeably bad. The translator who has truly done her job shouldn\u2019t be noticed. Gustave Flaubert (as translated by Francis Steegmuller) insisted that authors should be \u201clike God in the universe, present everywhere and visible nowhere.\u201d Such is the fate of good translators as well.<\/p>\n

As we approach our selection process for the longlist of the Best Translated Book Award<\/a>, I\u2019m finding that there are some books in the mix that truly shine. They were no doubt glorious in the original, and\u2014due to their translators\u2019 abilities as writers\u2014they are glorious in the English as well. And in these wonderful books, paradoxically, the translators\u2019 skills as writers have made them disappear as writers. The books now seem to be original works in English, as if an author has magically moved from her own language to English, without missing a beat. Many of these fantastic books have already been mentioned by other judges, but I thought I might emphasize a few here and applaud their ever-present, invisible translators. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The first is Steven Hartman\u2019s translation from the Swedish of Sleet<\/i><\/a>, by Stig Dagerman, a beautiful collection of short stories (David R. Godine, Publisher). Alice McDermott, in her preface to the collection, speaks of Dagerman as rivaling Joyce \u201cin his ability to depict the intractable loneliness of childhood, but time and again\u2026he tempers this loneliness with brief gestures of hope, connectedness.\u201d Hartman has captured Dagerman\u2019s sensitivity to the child\u2019s and others\u2019 points of view so beautifully in his translations\u2014the narrative distances involved, the narrative voice\u2014as to be rendered unnoticeable. What we are left with are quiet, humane, and often heart-wrenching stories, Hartman\u2019s interpretation of Dagerman\u2019s art. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Another book that I found to be astoundingly beautiful in English is Jeffrey Gray\u2019s translation from Spanish of The African Shore<\/i><\/a> by Rodrigo Rey Rosa (Yale University Press). Many of the BTBA<\/span> judges have praised this surprising, imagistic novel that takes place in Tangier and wanders between two characters, a shepherd dreaming of Spain and \u201cof riches to come\u201d and a Columbian tourist stranded in Morocco; it is a book mysteriously (and wonderfully) held together by an owl passing from hand to hand until it finally escapes, leaving us with a final startling image of the bird hiding in a dark attic. Rey Rosa was a prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Paul Bowles and we can see this in his startling imagery and spare prose (Bowles even translated some of his earlier books); Rey Rosa\u2019s style is widely praised: it is \u201cprecise, mythic\u201d (Rapha\u00eblle R\u00e9rolle) and this book in particular is \u201cinhabited both by poetry and by silence\u201d (Luis Alonso Girgado). This is the kind of book that could easily collapse under the weight of a plodding translation, but that is not the case here: Gray is keenly sensitive to the effects of the original as he interprets Rey Rosa\u2019s pure style\u2014including his silences\u2014and his imagery. I am sure Gray\u2019s work must have been endless to obtain that purity in the English. The sparest of prose shows the effects of translation even more: one misstep is glaring. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

There are a number of other books under consideration for this year\u2019s award that I\u2019ve found to have spectacular translations, but I\u2019ll only mention them here: Juliet Winter Carpenter\u2019s incredibly clean, beautiful translation from Japanese of A True Novel<\/i><\/a>, by Minae Mizumura (Other Press); Don Bartlett\u2019s creation of narrative voice in Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgaard\u2019s My Struggle: Book Two<\/i><\/a> (Archipelago Books). The extremely complicated, gorgeous sentences of Ottilie Mulzet\u2019s translation from Hungarian of L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Krasznahorkai\u2019s Seiobo There Below<\/i><\/a> from New Directions (see a great interview with Mulzet at The Quarterly Conversation with BTBA<\/span> judge Scott Esposito that shows just how complicated and challenging this book was to translate<\/a>). <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll end here on another one of my favorites so far from this year\u2019s selections, Sean Cotter\u2019s translation from Romanian of Mircea C\u0103rt\u0103rescu\u2019s Blinding: The Left Wing<\/i><\/a> (Archipelago Books). I remember when Cotter was first offered this book; we were at the American Literary Translators Association\u2019s annual conference, and he told me he\u2019d just been approached by Jill Schoolman of Archipelago about translating C\u0103rt\u0103rescu. The look on his face said it all: excitement\u2014such a great opportunity for a translator, this incredible novel-memoir that\u2019s considered one of the most important of contemporary Romanian literature\u2014and mixed with that excitement: fear of taking on such a daunting task. But from the original, Cotter has created a great a book in English, a journey through childhood and hospitalization, a \u201ckaleidoscope world\u201d as described on the book jacket, of \u201challucinatory Bucharest\u201d as told by a deeply sympathetic, vital narrator, a character that Cotter interpreted, created in English. Carla Bariez, a poet and translator from Romanian, had this to say about Cotter\u2019s translation in her review of the book for Words Without Borders: \u201cSean Cotter has done a masterful, inspired job with the translation. The meditative, Baroque rhythms of C\u0103rt\u0103rescu\u2019s Romanian flow into graceful, vigorous English thanks to Cotter.\u201d She goes on to talk about \u201cthe linguistic pyrotechnics\u201d of the book that might become \u201coverwhelming\u201d in a work that is \u201cdeeply philosophical,\u201d but to her, \u201cnothing seems gratuitous: language itself, in its long lists and flights of fancy, proves C\u0103rt\u0103rescu\u2019s ultimate point about birth. Every human life is a Gospel, every birth an Annunciation\u2026\u201d Cotter\u2019s sensitivity to language and to what he has interpreted as C\u0103rt\u0103rescu\u2019s intentions in his book are what have given us these \u201clinguistic pyrotechnics\u201d in English. <\/p>\n

I thought it would be illuminating to delve a bit more into Cotter\u2019s technique, so I asked him for a sample of the original novel plus a \u201ctrot,\u201d a \u201cliteral\u201d translation of this sample. Here\u2019s just a taste of his approach, with the opening lines of the novel:<\/p>\n

Before they built the apartment blocks across the street, before everything was screened off and suffocating, I used to watch Bucharest through the night from the triple window in my room above \u015etefan cel Mare. The window usually reflected the room\u2019s cheap furniture\u2014a bedroom set of yellowed wood, a dresser and mirror, a table with some aloe and asparagus in clay pots, a chandelier with globes of green glass, one of which had been chipped long ago. The reflected yellow space turned even yellower as it deepened into the enormous window, and I, a thin, sickly adolescent in torn pajamas and a stretched-out vest, would spend the long afternoon perched on the small cabinet in the bedstead, staring, hypnotized, into the eyes of my reflection in the transparent glass.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The paragraph goes on, but these opening sentences work together incredibly well, one leading rhythmically to the next, and Cotter\u2019s seemingly slight touches have intensified the imagery and sentences\u2019 effect. <\/p>\n

Here is the original in Romanian:<\/p>\n

\u00cenainte s\u0103 se construiasc\u0103 blocul de vizavi \u015fi totul s\u0103 devin\u0103 ecranat \u015fi irespirabil, priveam nop\u0163i \u00eentregi Bucure\u015ftiul de la tripla fereastr\u0103 panoramic\u0103 a camerei mele din \u015etefan cel Mare. Fereastra reflecta de obicei mobilierul s\u0103rac al \u00eenc\u0103perii, un dormitor de lemn g\u0103lbui, o toalet\u0103 cu oglind\u0103, c\u00e2teva plante, aloe \u015fi asparagus, \u00een ghivece de argil\u0103, a\u015fezate pe mas\u0103. Lustra cu abajururi de sticl\u0103 verzuie, unul dintre ele ciobit de mult timp. Spa\u0163iul galben al camerei devenea \u015fi mai galben ad\u00e2ncindu-se \u00een uria\u015fa fereastr\u0103, iar eu, un adolescent ascu\u0163it \u015fi boln\u0103vicios, \u00een pijama rufoas\u0103 \u015fi cu un fel de vest\u0103 l\u0103b\u0103r\u0163at\u0103 deasupra, st\u0103team toat\u0103 dup\u0103-amiaza a\u015fezat cu fundul pe lada de la studio, privind \u00een ochi, ca hipnotizat, reflectul meu din oglinda str\u0103vezie a ferestrei. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And here is a very rough, literal \u201ctrot\u201d:<\/p>\n

Before was built the block vis-avis and all became screened and unbreathable, I would look nights whole at Bucharest from the triple window panoramic of room my on \u015etefan cel Mare. The window reflected usually the furnishings poor of the room, a bedroom set of yellowy wood, a toilet with mirror, some plants, aloe and asparagus, in pots of clay, sat on the table. The light fixture with shades of glass greenish, one of them chipped of much time. The space yellow of the room became and more yellow getting deep in the giant window, and I an adolescent sharpened and sickly, in pajama ragged and a kind of vest misshapen on top, stayed all afternoon sat with bottom on the chest of the bedstead, looking in eyes, like a hypnotized person, the reflection my in the mirror see-through of the window.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Already, with the very first phrase of the opening, we see Cotter facing a dilemma: a lot of information in the Romanian is introduced with a dependent clause\u2014but the opening line of a novel has to be perfect, can\u2019t be overly cluttered with details, which are so hard to sustain in English. Cotter\u2019s decision to break that clause down into two dependent clauses, both introduced with a repetition of \u201cbefore,\u201d is very wise, I think, very musical, very inviting, almost hypnotic, reinforcing a dream-like atmosphere so appropriate to this book. Each sentence here shows this same level of attention. I\u2019m especially taken with the third sentence that pulls us closer to the narrator, where we see him for the first time, how beautifully we\u2019re led to him with an abstraction, the lovely, active phrasing here, the \u201cyellow space turned even yellower as it deepened into the enormous window,\u201d which is a long way from the what we find in the \u201ctrot,\u201d the much flatter \u201cyellow getting deep.\u201d Cotter has interpreted the author\u2019s intention with that abstraction, heightened the imagery and lyricism for his English rendition and prepared us for this important turn, the introduction of the narrator, the \u201cI,\u201d the \u201cthin, sickly adolescent\u201d staring at himself, hypnotized by his own eyes, his own frailty, reinforced by his thin, ghostly reflection not in a mirror but in a glass window. Even Cotter\u2019s choice at the end to replace the abstract \u201cwindow\u201d with the concrete word, \u201cglass,\u201d creates a strong effect: the image is much more tangible as a result.<\/p>\n

If you took any of these wonderful translations I\u2019ve mentioned and placed them alongside the original language versions, you\u2019d find similar choices to those that Cotter made in Blinding. These choices are everywhere in a translation; they involve every word, every punctuation mark. They\u2019re the endless choices and techniques that the best fiction translators use to make their English versions shine as brightly as possible, as brightly as the originals, while they, the translators, turn to shadows.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Elizabeth Harris has translated fiction by Mario Rigoni Stern, Fabio Stassi, and Marco Candida, among others. Her translation of Giulio Mozzi\u2019s story collection Questo \u00e8 il giardino (This Is the Garden) will be published by Open Letter Books in 2014; the individual stories have appeared in The Literary Review, The Missouri Review, The Kenyon Review, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":186,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67486],"tags":[1646],"class_list":["post-296656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-review"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/186"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296656"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296656\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":317676,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296656\/revisions\/317676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}