Why Do You Dance When You Walk? is Abdourahman Waberi’s most autobiographical work to date. Poet, novelist and essayist, his earlier stories and novels bring to life the story of his homeland, the former French colony of Djibouti. This tiny country of the Horn of Africa is roughly the same size as South West England, but its strategic position near the Red Sea and the world’s busiest shipping routes offers it a major strategic significance disproportionate to its smallness. A polyglot nation, its cultures and traditions are rooted in cosmopolitanism.
Category: Podcast
world voices
Podcast LIVE | In conversation with Fatima Daas, author of The Last One (in French & English)
An autobiographical first novel, The Last One tells the story of Fatima and her family. The confusing polarities between different worlds and cultures that are portrayed sparked an intense Media debate in France. Although based on true events and experiences, Fatima Daas changed certain aspects in order to be free to write what she wanted, and convey her feelings about specific events.
Tune in to hear a lively conversation with Fatima Daas and podcast host Georgia de Chamberet, about literary inspiration, handling her surprise overnight success, and the pressures directed at women from religion and from society, and more besides. The Last One is published in English, by HopeRoad Publishing. The interview is in both French and English.
Produced by BookBlast | Duration 26:25
The Last One by Fatima Daas, translated by Lara Vergnaud | HopeRoad Publishing | 192 pp 27 January 2022 | ISBN 978-1913109851
Buy THE LAST ONE from bookshop.org
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Podcast LIVE | In conversation with Natasha Lehrer, translator of Consent by Vanessa Springora
Vanessa Springora’s memoir, Consent, became an instant, international literary sensation when it was published in France. Her beautifully written, intimate and powerful description of her relationship in the mid-1980s with the French author Gabriel Matzneff, when she was fourteen and he fifty, is a beautifully written universal #MeToo story of power, manipulation, trauma, resilience and healing. Award-winning translator, Natasha Lehrer, captures Springora’s changes in pace and in tone, the voices and the silences, the literary milieu then and now with a sensitive ear and lexical deftness.
Podcast LIVE | Wrapping up Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 2
Hello, hello!
The second season of our weekly BookBlast Podcast series Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy went out in September. Our audience loved the first seven podcasts in the series so here’s the next eight for you to discover if you have not already done so!
The hosts, Georgia de Chamberet and Lucy Popescu, interview leading independent publishers, their award-winning or up-and-coming authors and highly creative translators filling a unique niche in showcasing inner and outer worlds, enriching our literary culture. Reviews of the books are featured in online journal, The BookBlast Diary.
So tune in and come on a literary adventure : it’s perfect to get you through lockdown 2.
Continue reading Podcast LIVE | Wrapping up Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 2
Podcast LIVE | Update: Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 1
Hello, hello!
Since the first seven episodes of our weekly series Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy went live in July, there are still eight episodes to look forward to. The hosts, Georgia de Chamberet and Lucy Popescu, interview independent publishers, their authors and highly creative translators filling a unique niche in showcasing myriad inner and outer worlds thereby enriching our literary culture.
When reading, do you “hear” the book as if it is being read to you by the author?
The voice tells us so much about a person. Where they come from, their personality and how they’re feeling. As important as the voices in writers’ heads are those that are heard by readers. Hearing authors and translators talk describe their vision and craft in our Bridging the Divide series will enhance your reading of their books.
Catch up, listen up!
Interview | J.S. Margot, author of the memoir Mazel Tov
What happens when a young Flemish woman at university in Antwerp teaches the four children of an Orthodox Jewish family to earn a bit of extra money? How does her first great love for an Iranian political refugee evolve? Read Henrietta Foster’s review HERE
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