More than the existential meeting between humans, I am very curious people and languages match. How do we fall in love not only with words, but with foreign words belonging to foreign worlds, that we are not connected through memories hanging up in the family tree? Me: I have a childhood fantasy of learning Mandarin (far from achieving it); or I love the sophisticated French-sounding but larger than French richness of meanings of the Persian language (very sloppy, as for now, unfortunately).
Jennifer Croft is a multi-awarded translator from Polish, Ukrainian and Argentinian Spanish (I am so glad that there are literate remarks about how rich the different versions of Spanish are). Homesick is more valuable than a translation though, as it shares a life story about real people, although in a translated version re-enacting actual memories.
´When we were kids I used to wish we could be octopuses, so we would not need words´.
Croft´s memoir is illustrated by photographic memories that do open ideatic pathways without expressing though. There is more left untold, about her life journey, sisterhood, leaving the physical home homesick for the worlds of words. Foreign words turned into home.
Croft is a translator that takes autorship to a new level. Translation is autorship too. She launched a campaign #TranslatorsontheCover. That´s where the translators should be. Translators can write books too. Sometimes in more than one mother tongue.
One day, I need to read more about the intellectual history of translations. Or someone should write it. Maybe/hopefully a translator.
Rating: 5 stars
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