Posts Tagged ‘Writing’

I am a licensed clinical social worker who spent four years counseling in several forensic environments. These settings varied and included crisis counseling in the administrative segregation unit of a women’s prison, leading educational groups to men found incompetent to stand trial, and assessing sex offenders in the death chamber of a maximum-security state prison (it turns out prisons lack conference rooms!) I look back on that work and am still struck by the profound depth of desperation found within those walls.

The stories of those with whom I worked were unique to each, yet the threads of commonality became predictable before my assessments even started. If I had to whittle down the common denominators of our forensic population, I would say they are low socioeconomic status, minimal education, and a history of significant, heinous abuse. Additionally, and I’m sure of no surprise to you the reader, there exists a disproportionate representation of minorities in our prison system.

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There is a fantastic new review of an essay on translating literature over at The Complete Review. Not only am I constantly impressed by the number of foreign-language books reviewed (either in translation or untranslated) over there, but the insight with which he addresses not only the merits of the work but the translation as well. This review deals with a new translation of That Mad Ache by Françoise Sagan, translated by Douglas R. Hofstadter.

What is especially interesting is that the book has two covers—a front and back. The front is for the text, the back, when turned upside down, is the cover of the long essay on translation by Hofstadter included with the text. I haven’t read it, but having read the review I think it’s safe to say that I will likely disagree with his discussion of translation in major parts. I would not translate Bonjour tristesse as Howdy, Blues, and don’t feel the need to elucidate texts as a translator—that is the job of the critic, teacher, or student. In any case, having not read it I was still struck by the magnitude of giving the translator not only so much page space in the book, but his own cover. And, according to The Complete Review, listing him on the front not as a translator but co-author.

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