In this creative ‘Christmas’ essay, Hannah Hutchings-Georgiou reflects on the power and therapeutic potential of drawing in her own life, the artistic practise of Louise Bourgeois, and Jean Frémon’s new text Nativity (Les Fugitives).
In her third virtual dinner party of the year, Susanna Crossman invites translators and writers Saudamini Deo, Denise Rose Hansen, and Emma Rault to discuss different modes of translating, the fascistic notion of an “original” language, the work of Ann Quin and the ghosts behind translation.
Elodie Rose Barnes explores the epic English and Spanish poetry anthology, The Sea Needs No Ornament / El mar no necesita ornamento, and talks to its translators, Loretta Collins Klobah and Maria Grau Perejoan, about the translation process, empowering women writers from the Caribbean and the literary history behind the poems.
After an Erasmus exchange in Paris, artist and art historian Kathryn Cutler-MacKenzie discovered that translation is about the space between languages and voices; a space that affords us new connections, ideas and friendships.
Learning both English and Urdu at school, and teaching French after university, Naima Rashid initially felt dislocated from her “mother tongue” and land. But, on reading Urdu again, she’s discovered it’s ‘the space between languages’ that feels like home.
Little did Toni Roberts know that her decision to study Spanish at school would turn into a life-long love for a language that has since given her confidence, creativity and, above all, joy.
Virginie Despentes’ King Kong Theory is an angry and passionate manifesto against late capitalist patriarchy, a story about sexual assault and trauma that centres the survivor.
On reading Emily Wilson’s translation of Homer’s Odyssey, Georgia Poplett started to consider the misogynistic history behind language and the way translated words have been used to harm and heal womxn.
Elodie Rose Barnes reviews Sissal Kampmann’s Faroese poetry collection, Darkening/Myrking, and speaks to translator Marita Thomsen about translating Kampmann’s work, Faroese weather, gender in language, and reading translated texts.
Elodie Rose Barnes talks to translator Jennifer Russell about translating Amalie Smith’s masterful new novel, Marble, the hybridity and liminality of translation, the brilliance of Danish sculptor Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen, new projects with writer Ursula Scavenius and more.
Amalie Smith’s exciting new novel, Marble, sensuously intertwines the story and discoveries of its titular heroine with those of pioneering sculptor Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen, who lived and worked 110 years earlier. In this preview, Marble reflects on Carl-Nielsen’s time in Athens and the new material reality open to her when separated from her lover.
Nina Mingya Powles’ exciting new collection, Magnolia, 木蘭, is a celebratory exploration of languages, and the cultures, experiences, and worlds that lie within them.
