Lives in Translation: Bilingual Writers on Identity and Creativity [Hardcover]

Isabelle de Courtivron (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 18, 2003

Being bilingual. What does it mean? Living in two languages, between two languages, or in the overlap of two languages? What is it like to write in a language that is not the language in which you were raised? To create in words other than those of your earliest memories, so far from the words of home and childhood and origin? To speak and write in a language other than the one which you once believed held the seamless connection between words and things? Do you constantly translate yourself, constantly switch, shift, alternate, not just vocabulary and syntax but consciousness and feelings? In a series of original essays, writers reflect on questions of identity, of choice, and of the difficult search for self and place. Products of the post-war global realities in which they have matured, they interrogate the individual, they explore the intimate experience, they ponder the strange itineraries that have led them from a childhood in one language to a writing life in another. Authors include Anita Desai, Eva Hoffman, Ariel Dorfman, Sylvia Molloy, Yoko Tawada, Shirley Geok-Lin Lim, Anton Shammas, Assia Djebar.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Language, writes Ariel Dorfman, "contains the seeds of immigrants' most intimate identity." Thus, living in two languages presents a challenge to that identity. How does a writer, whose medium is language, confront such a challenge? De Courtivron, herself an immigrant to the U.S. from France and a professor at MIT, has gathered essays from more than a dozen authors exploring these issues. They come from all over the world and speak a multitude of tongues: Anton Shammas, an Israeli Arab, wryly relates his fumbling effort as a boy to buy sunflower seeds in Hebrew; Sylvia Molloy, raised bilingual in Argentina, writes of "shuttling between languages," which she finds "liberating" but also "laborious"; Yoko Tawada, a Japanese writer who lived for years in Germany, considers how words determine perception and describes her "multilingual web." Readers need not be bilingual to appreciate these fine essays; anyone fascinated by the mysteries of language and the art of writing will find much to admire here.
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Review

"Lives in Translation’s welcome achievement is to bring together reflection from an array of internationally acclaimed writers…known for both multiple identities and their pondering of border crossings."—The Philadelphia Enquirer

“Overall, Lives in Translation offers fascinating reading for anyone with an interest in or first-hand experience with bi- or multilingualism."—Comparative Literature Studies

“Lives in Translation is a very beautiful and magical book, written in many voices and many inflections. It is a testament to the privileges and perils that human beings discover when they cross a linguistic boundary and discover not just other customs and other people but another self, another me. A priceless addition to the literature of exile.” — André Aciman, author of Out of Egypt and False Papers

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan; 1 edition (July 18, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1403960666
• ISBN-13: 978-1403960665
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #868,239 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)