Tag: new york

Review | Three Women, Lucy Tertia George | Book of the Week

“Be the heroine of your life, not the victim.” – Nora Ephron

A strong woman is not defined by men, but is in full possession of herself and her life. She balances her masculine and feminine sides; is her own person. She has fought and survived many battles; internal and external. She works hard, gets straight back up when knocked down, speaks for herself.

Such is Grandma: the first in a triptych of very different women whom we meet at the opening of this thought-provoking first novel that is rooted in feminist tropes which the author understands and conveys so well. Continue reading Review | Three Women, Lucy Tertia George | Book of the Week

Interview | Michael Z. Wise, co-founder, New Vessel Press | Indie Publisher of the Week

Are (were) your parents great readers? Tell us a bit about yourself.
I’ve enjoyed reading since I was a child — yes, my parents encouraged me to study and explore books. After studying French in high school and living for a summer with a French family in Clermont Ferrand, I have loved reading in other languages.

Did you want to work in the publishing industry from the start?
I’m relatively new to the business of publishing, although I’ve written a book (Capital Dilemma: Germany’s Search for a New Architecture of Democracy) I only co-founded New Vessel Press with Ross Ufberg in 2012. We’re both passionate about literature and foreign literature in particular — I read French and German and Ross reads Russian and Polish — but neither of us has prior experience in publishing. We’ve been learning as we go along which has made building a new house a challenge but great fun. Nowadays the publishing world is changing so rapidly that I’d venture that we have just as much of a clue as to where things are going as more traditional, established houses. Continue reading Interview | Michael Z. Wise, co-founder, New Vessel Press | Indie Publisher of the Week

Spotlight | The A to Z of Literary Translation, Georgia de Chamberet | Words without Borders 2008

The A to Z of Literary Translation by Georgia de Chamberet was posted on the Words without Borders blog in instalments from February to  May 2008. It was circulated at the Masters Class in Translation Studies which Alane Mason (W.W. Norton) and Dedi Felman (Simon & Schuster) team taught in at Columbia University in the City of New York in 2008. Founded in 2003, Words without Borders is a superb site which promotes cultural understanding through the translation, publication, and promotion of the finest contemporary international literature.
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I contributed to the @wwborders blog from 2005-2009. Whilst writing about English PEN’s Writers in Translation committee of which I was a founder member—tapping into my experiences as an editor, agent and publicist—the idea of doing a fun, but far from definitive listing, The A to Z of Literary Translation came to mind.

Artistry and adaptation are essential to the process of literary translation, since translation is an act of writing. Also accuracy and avoiding short cuts based on the when in doubt, cut it out approach. Writers make good translators—obvious examples being Baudelaire (translator of Edgar Allen Poe) and Robert Graves (translator of classical Latin and Greek authors and George Sand).

Beyond words into the mystery of language, and its cultural hinterland, is where a good translator will carry the reader on a journey of discovery. Good literature is primarily concerned with human beings, and is cosmopolitan, traveling beyond national identity and a book’s original social and cultural context—the same goes for a good translation.

Continue reading Spotlight | The A to Z of Literary Translation, Georgia de Chamberet | Words without Borders 2008

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