Why You Should Translate Arabic Novels into English (Yes, You)
Well, I suppose if you don’t know Arabic, or English, or if you’d rather be painting or scaling mountains, then forget I said “yes, you.” But if you want to […]
On Translation
Machines and Arabic-English Translation
During Humphrey Davies’ talk on literary translation at the AUC this February, a young man in the audience asked about machine translation. Davies laughingly brushed off the question, saying that […]
Ahdaf Souief: Arabic and English Cooperate, Don’t Compete
Following Ahdaf Souief’s appearance at the Dubai literary festival this past week, a somewhat jumbled collection of (her) quotes was published in the Gulf News. Souief is a writer (Map […]
What Brings You to Arabic Literature?
For the next week, I’ll be traveling in Luxor and Aswan. Posting again March 19, insha’allah. I was speaking to a PhD student after the Jonathan Wright talk at the […]
Jonathan Wright: The Journalist as Literary Translator
The AUC translators series, which hosted its third speaker last night, invites interesting comparisons. Journalist and translator Jonathan Wright spoke yesterday at the university’s downtown campus, addressing issues of translation […]
Translation of Poetry an ‘Arduous’ Task?
New York University’s Abu Dhabi branch has a new project (and a new way to save Arabic in the Emirates?): translating pre-modern Arabic poetry. The “Library of Arabic Literature” project […]
Miss the Humphrey Davies Talk at the AUC?
If you like reports and summaries, I’ve got a highlight reel. Ursula did a piece about it. There are reports and summaries. But if you like the whole thing, they’ve […]
Sinaan Antoon on Why Writers Should Translate
استفدت كثيراً من ترجمة الشعر التي أمارسها منذ سنوات. I have benefited greatly from the translation of poetry…. فهي أهم تمرين، برأيي، بعد الكتابة نفسها لأنّك تواجه تحديّات العثور على […]
Tarif Khalidi on Transating the Qur’an
I think some of what Khalidi says can also apply to literary translations. The same “foreignizing” vs. “domesticizing” debate exists in literary translation: In essence this boils down to the […]