Tag Archives: Dorothy Potter Snyder
Global Feminist Translators Unite!: “The Routledge Handbook of Translation, Feminism, and Gender,” edited by Luise von Flotow and Hala Kamal
The Handbook shows a global community of women linguists at work and reveals what a fast-developing field of translation studies truly is. It demonstrates that it’s a fool’s errand to talk about “accurate” translation, though “good” or “beautiful” translation is possible, as well as translation that dares to pursue a socially progressive agenda. As translators, we are called to develop feminist techniques and criticism, not only of the words on the page, but also when considering who gets to translate, edit, and publish our books, as well as how our words are illustrated, printed, and marketed.
It’s All Relative: The Multifold Self in Sergio Pitol’s “The Love Parade,” Translated from Spanish by G.B. Henson
“The Love Parade” is like a Japanese fan that slowly opens, revealing a beautifully painted landscape while still concealing the face behind it. What we learn about Miguel del Solar is divulged by the huge cast of characters he interviews for his book, each of whom embodies a fragment of his past. He is investigating a murder (or murders) that took place at the Minerva building where he lived as a child, a European-style mini-castle built in 1908 to house the representatives of foreign governments in Mexico City.
On the Pleasures of Reading and Translating Women Writers: An Interview with Dorothy Potter Snyder
It is not for us as translators to smooth the way, to explain, or to make things easier for the English language reader. Translators have to trust that good readers will prefer to work a bit harder rather than be denied the chance to experience the writer’s voice as directly as possible.
Zero Is a Lens to See: Karla Suárez’s “Havana Year Zero,” translated from Spanish by Christina MacSweeney
By Dorothy Potter Snyder I have learned that the lines we draw to contain the infinite end up excluding more than they enfold. I have learned that most things in life are better and more beautiful not linear but fractal. Love especially. – Maria Popova What’s the sum total of anything – food, gasoline, hope, or […]
On Gender, Pseudonyms, and Authorship: Eloy Tizón, “The Names” and Greta Alonso, “A Shield, a Shelter, a Place to Hide,” Translated by Dorothy Potter Snyder
The essays that follow were written by Spanish writers Eloy Tizón and Greta Alonso in response to a question put to them by El Cultural: “Women writers past and present: Is publishing under a pseudonym necessary anymore, or is it just another marketing tool?” I found great beauty and insight in their responses and so […]
Foreign Bodies: Margarita García Robayo’s “Holiday Heart,” translated from Spanish by Charlotte Coombe
The uncomfortable, ailing human body is foregrounded in this thematically dense novel, a fable about problematic motherhood and the hard labor of forging epistemological change in the 21st century.
Live on August 31, 2020: Special Issue on Elena Ferrante’s New Novel “The Lying Life of Adults,” Translated by Ann Goldstein
Elena Ferrante and the Question of Gender, Pseudonyms, and Authorship
Silvina Ocampo’s Queer Eye: “Forgotten Journey,” translated by Suzanne Jill Levine and Katie Lateef-Jan; and “The Promise,” translated by Levine and Jessica Powell
By Dorothy Potter Snyder Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.) —Walt Whitman, Song of Myself Es tan corto el amor y tan largo el olvido. — Chavela Vargas Queerness resists definition and finds expression in the manifold array of ways of being and seeing in […]