Translation – My Own RE:public

Pas de deux

Le Pays des autres 2: Regardez-nous danser (read by me in German as Schaut, we wir tanzen, and available in English translation as Watch Us Dance) continues Leila Slimani’s family saga; a fictional dive into the colorful, often murky and treacherous depths of her own dynastic history, the first part of which I wrote enthusiastically about here and which ended with the beginning of the end of colonial rule in Morocco.

When the story continues, it is the summer of 1968 and more than a decade has passed since Morocco gained its independence from France (in 1956), but the country is struggling now under another – this time home-grown – brand of tyranny: defined through its authoritarian monarch, a brutal police and judicial system in cahoots with a corrupted elite and a patriarchal hegemony. It is to this Morocco that Aïcha, who so entranced with her intelligence and originality as a little girl, returns after some years studying medicine in Strasbourg. For one summer – and then perhaps a lifetime. One is tempted to say: she returns to the fold. But that is something for sheep, and an instinctive follower is this young woman not. Nor lost, nor castout. Rather it is to the bosom of her family in Meknès that she returns; their fortunes having risen in the ensuing years and now with a place amongst a burgeoning new marocaine bourgeoisie. The reader remains alert still to Aïcha’s contrariness: her self-possession and her selflessness; her wanting to please and her not giving a fig; her intellectual rationality and discipline and her emotional inner-life and flights into religious mysticism. One empathizes with Aïcha, with each dilemma she faces (and faces down) – her love of family, of friends and two nations; and the loyalties demanded and the conflicts that ensue – always knowing that the latest will be not the last.

And because she so fascinated me in In the Country of Others, I concentrate on Aïcha (and I suspect Slimani developed her character to be the focus – clearly inspired by her mother but also with a good dose of self one could think), others in the Belhaj family have central moments; both individually and in their interactions amongst each other. (The changing perspectives are – along with her blissfully short and elegant sentences – a defining quality of Slimani’s writing.) Aïcha’s parents, Amine and Mathilda, of course: the very personification of two nations in co-habitation; each with their own truth, intimately attached and profoundly detached, forgiving and unforgiving in equal measure. It is not always clear who is controlling whom. But there is a sort of love, that is frayed, tested, rarely acknowledged – and a lot of regret. The radical choices of Amine’s siblings, Omar and Selma, have only become more so since the first book. But this story here is one of more youthful years spent during a time of immense social and political upheaval, and so Aïcha’s path is very much juxtaposed against that of her younger brother Selim – restless, sexually awakened in ways unexpected. As Aïcha returns to the nest so does Selim take wing.

Aïcha pursues her career in obstetrics. Aïcha marries Mehdi – once, theoretically, a Marxist, now, practically speaking, beholden to the government. The book ends in 1971; the king has survived an assassination attempt, and Aïcha has brought her own child into the world.

Explicit in the title, dancing can be extended from the very reality of the clubs and bars of Casablanca and beyond where the young of Morocco gather to a metaphorical place; for it is a heady time of post-colonial uncertainty when power dynamics have changed and can be visualized as two parties skirting around each other, conscious of their position in any one moment, but unsure of their next step, and this reflected in the age-old story of when boy meets girl, of codes and signals, of swirling skirts and feigned youthful insouciance. Dualities abound in Leïla Slimani’s narrative, and this series could be well described as a pas de deux, whereby here there are no clear partitions; each blends into the next; from the entrée to the adagio and with some variations. I await with anticipation the continuation and culmination (coda) – presumably due from Gallimard this year or next.

Did I mention the translation? No, I did not. Translators should always be credited. I know enough to be quite confident that Amelie Thoma captures Slimani’s literary voice beautifully in German. (Of the English translation I cannot say, but Sam Taylor has creds so to speak!)

Emma B. & Elizabeth F.

Over a festive season that stretched my resources, I turned to a German translation of Flaubert’s Madame Bovary; translated by Elisabeth Edl (admired by me for her translations of Patrick Modiano) and much lauded at the time of publication in 2012. And, I must say it seems to have left a greater impression upon me than whatever English version I may have read in the past (but not the one by Lydia Davis, also from 2012) did; for I don’t remember previously having been as stimulated … or, as moved … as this reading has left me.

To be said on this particular edition: Beyond the literary work, the notes throughout are extensive, as is Edl’s translation essay; included also in the volume are the proceedings from the law case brought against Flaubert for … what? … obscenity, shall we say … by the French public prosecutors of the day. This latter inclusion was a first in the German language, and whether it has found its way into any of the English translations to date I don’t know. At least, it – the trial, the outcome (‘case dismissed’, so to speak), the repercussions (for society, for literature) – lives, still, in academia. This essay by Christine Haines published in French Politics, Culture & Society Vol. 23, No. 2 (Summer 2005), pp 1-27 and available on JSTOR is just one example.

Of an evening (that is, in bed!) my seriously serious book reading is intermittently interrupted by other forms of Lektüre, sometimes of a more frivolous nature and sometimes not. Definitely belonging to the latter; the latest (or the one before that) issue of the LRB. And, it was there, around about this Christmas time, that I was interested to read a review piece by Julian Barnes (Vol. 45 No. 24 · 14 December 2023) inspired by a new Monet biography by Jackie Wollschläger. With that, I won’t flex my (puny) Impressionist muscles; Julian Barnes may be able to get away with being an amateur art critic/historian/connoisseur, but, I not! It just reminded me that Barnes and Flaubert appear to have taken up firm residence in a similar crevice of my brain. Hardly surprising says she (to herself), recalling a stuffed parrot. But, amongst other things, I also remember his essay (also in the LRB) on the Lydia Davis translation of Madame Bovary, and that it was far from complimentary. And, this I remember because I remember it having coincided with my reading of the first volume of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time in a then new translation and also from Davis, and I further remember having been momentarily concerned that I wasn’t getting the best of Proust. What, if anything, Barnes has had to say about her Swann’s Way, I don’t know. Or, just can’t remember!

The Iliad by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson review – a bravura feat | Homer | The Guardian

Six years on from her translation of the Odyssey, Wilson revels in the clarity and emotional clout of Homer’s battlefield epic
— Read on www.theguardian.com/books/2023/sep/27/the-iliad-by-homer-translated-by-emily-wilson-review-a-bravura-feat

There are sure to be many in the next days, weeks, so as I come across new reviews I’ll directly post them (if possible) – and comment later if I think necessary . This from Edith Hall, who hardly needs an introduction – but here’s one anyway.

‘The Iliad may be ancient – but it’s not far away’: Emily Wilson on Homer’s blood-soaked epic | Classics | The Guardian

Following her acclaimed translation of the Odyssey, Wilson has turned to Homer’s other, darker poem. She explains how she got stuck for six months – and why it speaks to today’s era of conflict
— Read on www.theguardian.com/books/2023/sep/09/the-iliad-may-be-ancient-but-its-not-far-away-emily-wilson-on-homers-blood-soaked-epic

One poet many voices

“Exit Hector, Again and Again: How Different Translators Reveal the ‘Iliad’ Anew” by Emily Wilson, The New York Times, June 28, 2023.

In English alone there are about 100 translations of Homer’s Iliad; to which we may add Emily Wilson’s new translation (to be published in September presumably). Her excellent comparative essay in The New York Times shows the range of interpretive possibilities of Homer’s epic poem through the ages – from the original to George Chapman in 1611 through to the contemporary culminating with that of her own (a sneak preview if you will!), in various metrical forms and not, rhyming and not – and exemplified in the memorable scene when Hector bids farewell to Andromache and his baby son (book 6. 482-497).

Wilson shares her translation of this passage. Again, as she did with Ulysses, she uses the iambic pentameter of Shakespeare and Milton, and her vocabulary choices and turn of phrase in this small sample already recall to me very much that work. And reminds me how very much I have been looking forward to her Iliad.

Out of France

Patrick Modiano & annie Ernaux

Read in the last days, two of my most favored French writers. Two novels with significant differences and some intrinsic similarities. Both modest in length and profound in content.

Firstly, Patrick Modiano’s newest work Chevreuse (Gallimard, 2021), read by me as Unterwegs nach Chevreuse (Hanser, 2022) and with an English translation due to be published as Scene of the Crime by Yale University Press next year.

I remember repeating – to only then deny – the oft heard criticism that one Modiano is some how not much different to the one that came before, and it would not surprise if the same arguments are not still to be heard in respect of Chevreuse. I even admit to brief moments of déjà vu, during which I did wonder whether I hadn’t strayed into familiar territory, situation. But why should I not, for that uncertainty is essential to memory. So one reads on, and is again seduced by that particular atmospheric that Modiano effortlessly conjures; imbued with images of the past; of person and place; haunting and defining each future until they too bow to the dictates of time.

Out of the city, westward beyond the 16th arrondissement with its bourgeoisie enclave of Auteuil on the edge of the Bois de Boulogne and into the idyllic country side of the Chevreuse via the Rue du Docteur-Kurzenne in Jouy-en-Josas. These are the main places of the journey that our writing protagonist Jean Bosmans takes us on as he excavates his childhood, his more youthful years and some intermittent; in search of the past and in the interest of his literary form – and that of Modiano; the third person, if you will, in command of the narrative. (A choice of perspective that perhaps allows for some distance – whether reliable is another matter.)

Typically (for Modiano), this narrative exists in multiple time frames – the elderly writer Bosmans in approximately the here and now, his younger self during the mid-1960s, and the child of fifteen years previously. Whereby it is those middle years that drive the particulars of the story; those youthful years of first experiences and great expectations. And, it is no wonder, for they are his formative years as a writer, and he is beginning to understand that one of the greatest tools for his craft lay in the fusion of memory – that is, lived experience and emotion as it roots itself in the subconscious and takes on its on life over time – and the creative processes of imagination.

Chance meetings that aren’t (for instance, with the lovely Camille, incongruously called “tête de mort”, about which I note an English translation predicament: “dead head” is very literal but perhaps too much “Grateful Dead” for my tastes!), a sinister cast of characters with changing names, too many coincidences, too many echoes from blurred childhood memories, all stimulate the young writer’s imagination, and all the time Modiano, with his wonderful gift for blending the stations of his own life with those of his fictive, half-fictive characters, is creating a new reality – for the page, the reader and maybe even himself.

le 14 juillet

That is today. La fête nationale française. The 14^th of July, or Bastille Day as I have always called it.

Coming just after the 15o^th anniversary of the birth of Marcel Proust , on 10^th July, 1871, I use this proximity and this day to rekindle a too long dormant fascination with the great French writer. See it as my own personal gesture of admiration for La Grande Nation (as the Germans call it – and not always with affection!).

In the arts pages of a German newspaper last week (FAZ); a collection of snippets from those who have, at some time or other, turned to Proust – and, with various degrees of success. One, Louis Begley, succeeded as a young man where others failed, and later was enriched not only in a literary sense but also in that Proust led him to the love of his life. Begley took the opportunity to do a little promotion in this regard for his wife, Anka Muhlstein. In celebration of Proust’s anniversary, Penguin Random House have released a special paperback edition of her 2012 book Monsieur Proust’s Library which explores the literary influences of one who was to on and so profoundly influence other writers, and up to this day. The synopsis on the publisher’s website insinuates this to be a light – and encouraging – read, for those who persist in their struggle.

My copy of the Penguin Classics six volume edition of “In Search of Lost Time”

And I am in need of some encouragement, for as you may have guessed, as Begley succeeded so have I failed. It is to be clearly discerned from the condition of the spines of the paperback volumes of In Search of Lost Time (or perhaps I should use the French title À la Recherche du temps perdu; as I remember even the translation of the title is forever a matter of heated debate) standing on my bookshelf that, generously speaking, I made it half way through – though I am relatively sure I didn’t make it to the end of The Guermantes Way. When? Twenty years ago? Is that possible? What precisely happened I don’t know; distracted, presumably put to one side, then packed away – as life, and my place in it, moved on.

Also, a few days ago I caught a very nice discussion on the Times Literary Supplement’s weekly podcast (always informative listening) with Professor of French and Comparative Literature at the University of Exeter and Proust expert, Adam Watt. Embedded below, and to be found about 4 minutes in or, in Spotify reckoning, at approximately -48:00.

The TLS Podcast – July 7th, 2021.

Watt’s essay for the TLS July 9, 2021, issue, can be found here. Take note, though; access is only granted to a very limited amount of articles in any one month, so good luck!

Now, then, Monsieur Proust, you have my attention! At least, I have taken you again to hand or, to be precise, the first volume of your monumental work, which, in this translation by Lydia Davis, is titled The Way by Swann’s as opposed to Swann’s Way; also a matter of contention. (Whilst all under the aegis of Christopher Prendergast, each volume has a different translator.) On Lydia Davis. I must say, after reading some terrific flash fiction stuff by the so named a few years ago, I had to check whether this was in fact the same person whose name I remembered from the Proust translation. And indeed it was. A New Yorker profile in 2014 explained the French connection and much more (including an American literary first marriage of the highest order – of which I was probably one of the few to be ignorant of).

As an aside, some words of encouragement: a way once lost remains to be found!

Let the search begin, one may be tempted to say; if it wasn’t for that complicated pas de deux of Being and Time – that illusive intangible that constrains and dictates; that essence which he and his accomplice – that other with the name Marcel just as he, and much more than a reflection of each self – sought with word to tame; to make palpable; just like the most famous little cake of all time – soaked in tea, not once but three times, melting into involuntary memory.