Tag Archives: Literary translation
Selected Poems from Marie Keletaona Tamole’s Les Murmures de l’océan / Fakamusumusu o le moana / (The Ocean’s Whisperings), Translated by Jean Anderson
Jean Anderson translates selected poems from Marie Keletaona Tamole’s collection Les Murmures de l’océan / Fakamusumusu o le moana / (The Ocean’s Whisperings) in homage to her natal island, Futuna.
From Ocean to Ocean, a Translator’s Note by Jean Anderson
Jean Anderson offers a reflection on her translations of Marie Tamole Keletaona’s poetry in memory of her home island of Futuna.
“The Word Became Flesh” a short story by Nathalie Hermine, Translated by Karen Fleetwood & Laëtitia Saint-Loubert
“The Word Became Flesh” is a short story by Reunionese writer Nathalie Hermine, originally published in French as “La vie se fît chair,” and translated into English by Karen Fleetwood and Laëtitia Saint-Loubert.
Translation as Excavation, A Translators’ Note
Contemporary Reunionese literature remains significantly underrepresented in the English-speaking literary world.[1] This observation informed our decision to translate Nathalie Hermine’s ‘Le verbe se fit chair,’ from her collection Ma plus grande douleur sera de ne pouvoir te secourir (Saint-Denis de La Réunion: Éditions Poisson Rouge, 2021), for the present special issue, as part of a broader translation dynamic that seeks to contribute to the greater visibility and circulation of Reunionese writing beyond its original linguistic and geographical contexts.[2] This project follows two other recent collaborative translations of Reunionese novels – the translation, for the Irish and UK markets, of Gaëlle Bélem’s first two novels, There’s a Monster Behind the Door (Sligo: Bullaun Press, 2024) and The Rarest Fruit (Sligo: Bullaun Press, 2025) – which similarly aimed to participate in expanding the reach of these works and fostering new encounters between Reunionese literature and international readers.
A Bi-lingual Review of “Non-noyées (Undrowned)” by Alexis Pauline Gumbs in French Translation
Published in the United States in 2020, Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals is the work of Alexis Pauline Gumbs, author, poet, independent scholar and Afro-feminist activist whose work exists at the crossroad between decolonial ecology, critical theory and collective care. Undrowned presents itself as a hybrid and innovative blend of poetry, marine biology, and political meditation in which Gumbs explores the notions of survival, collective care, and liberation. The text brings together climate justice, feminine experience, the human condition and more largely the mammal experience. Breathing appears simultaneously as a physiological necessity and antiracial and anticolonial praxis.
Translator Allison M. Charette in Conversation with Michèle Rakotoson
In this conversation, translator Allison M. Charette discusses Malagasy literature with author Michèle Rakotoson.
Coral Relation: Reading translated excerpts from Denis Pourawa’s “Our Coral Soul”
Denis Pourawa is a Kanak (Indigenous) writer born in 1974 in Nouméa, the capital city of Kanaky/New Caledonia, a French-speaking archipelago situated close to Aotearoa/New Zealand and Australia in the Pacific Ocean. In 2003, he wrote his first children’s book; since, he has published (and performed) in a variety of literary genres, including poetry, theatre, short essays, and slam poetry. A member of the Mérénémé tribe, Pourawa’s work is influenced by his childhood memories, Kanak tradition, and his first encounter with “occidental thinking” through literature, which encouraged him to dedicate his life to the arts.
In Conspiracy with Dante: Maria Massucco Interviews Translator Mary Jo Bang
To mark the occasion of the 700th anniversary of Dante’s death, Stanford Professor Robert Pogue Harrison and graduate student Donatella D’Aguanno orchestrated a panel that brought poet and translator Mary Jo Bang together in conversation with Emeritus Professor Marjorie Perloff. I saw the occasion as an opportunity to ask this most creative and skilled wordsmith a few questions about her process, her relationship to Dante, and her place in a long line of Dante translators.
Time Out of Joint: Sandro Veronesi’s “The Hummingbird,” Translated from Italian by Elena Pala
In Sandro Veronesi’s second Strega Prize-winning work of fiction, we follow the protagonist, Dr Marco Carrera, a Florentine ophthalmologist, as he stumbles through a life strewn with miscommunications, misjudgements, and misfortunes.
A Plague for Our Times: Albert Camus’ “The Plague,” Translated from French by Laura Marris
It is impossible to read The Plague now without thinking of COVID-19 and its globally catastrophic and ongoing wreckage. With Laura Marris’ new translation, we have a text for the twenty-first century. I hesitate to write “for a new generation,” as accurate as that may be, because even those of us who’ve read Stuart Gilbert’s translation can find new meaning, new life, in Marris’ extraordinary translation.
A Band of Translators: In Conversation with the Turkoslavia Translation Collective
Collective of literary translators—Sabrina Jaszi, Mirgul Kali, and Ena Selimović—working from Turkic and Slavic languages. In this interview, the members of the collective discuss how they met, why they formed a translators’ collective, and their current projects.
The Built-in Approachability of Culture in “Well-Versed: Exploring Modern Japanese Haiku,” A Haiku Anthology Edited by Ozawa Minoru, Translated by Janine Beichman
After Basho and his immediate disciples, haiku gradually fell out of artistic favor in Japanese society until Masaoka Shiki revitalized it as a respected art form in the late 19th century. “Well-Versed” captures everything that has happened since, with 300 haiku written from around 1900 to the present day.
Stumbling Through the “Foreign”: A Look at Poupeh Missaghi’s Poetics of Translation
Although “trans(re)lating house one” is presented to us in English, Missaghi insists that Persian is the true language of its characters and city. The book was ‘translated’ from Persian to English, then, before it was ever written. For this reason, throughout her novel, Missaghi seeks to “acknowledge the Otherness of both the territory and the language to you, make them visible, and celebrate them” (35).
The Poetics of the Fluid Self: Mónica-Ramón Ríos’ “Cars on Fire,” Translated from Spanish by Robin Myers
Arguably, reading literature in translation can be compared to a leap of faith. Faith in the skilled voice and resources of the translator, faith in the power of the narrative to work its spell independently of the linguistic code it is set to traverse. Ultimately, faith in language itself to create for us a world we can inhabit, for as long as the reading experience lasts. “Cars on Fire,” in Robin Myers’ eloquent English-language rendition, provides just that. Through a succession of 18 stories written originally in Spanish by Mónica Ramón Ríos, we are allowed into an uncertain space that is both alluring and unsettling. It questions our sense of the immovable nature of the self, uncovers the precariousness fabric of identity and the complex, double-edged power and frailty of human connections.
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.