Accidental Translator<\/strong><\/p>\nA self-described reluctant student, Grossman disliked all her teachers in high school except for one\u2014her Spanish teacher. \u201cShe had figured me out, she got me. She was very, very perceptive, and so I was very happy in her class,\u201d says Grossman.<\/p>\n
Inspired by that relationship, Grossman went on to major in Spanish and did graduate work in Spanish and Latin American literature. She started translating a few texts for Review, a publication by the Americas Society, a forum dedicated to increasing appreciation for culture in Latin America, the Caribbean and Canada. One day, her neighbor, a literary agent, called Grossman and asked if she would be interested in translating Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said, \u2018Are you kidding? Of course!\u2019 It was absolutely brilliant to translate his work,\u201d says Grossman.<\/p>\n
Right away, she became enamored with the process. \u201cI really liked the puzzle of reading a statement in Spanish and figuring out how it would sound in English. What level of discourse would you use? What kind of language would you use? Would you use elevated language? Would you use colloquial language? Is it street Spanish? Is it academic Spanish? And what level of English matches it?\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Like Grossman, Natasha Wimmer, 40, fell into translation by chance. She has translated Vargas Llosa but is best known for her translation of Chilean author Roberto Bola\u00f1o\u2019s most acclaimed, and complex, novels\u2014The Savage Detectives and 2666. Originally from Iowa, she moved to Madrid as a child.<\/p>\n
Her mother fell in love with the language, and Wimmer quickly followed suit. Later in life, she was working as an editor at a publishing company when she received a book by Pedro Juan Guti\u00e9rrez, a Cuban novelist. When she couldn\u2019t find a translator for it, she decided to do it herself.<\/p>\n
Shortly after, Wimmer\u2019s boss asked her to write a report on The Savage Detectives to see if the company wanted to buy it. She was immediately taken with the novel.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought it was the best thing I had read in 10 years, in any language, and I had read a lot of stuff on submission and was pretty critical and not easily swayed,\u201d says Wimmer. She went on to translate it, an endeavor that took her about a year and a half.<\/p>\n
Published in 1998, the novel unfolds in 1970s Mexico City. In it, young poets, delirious with love for the written word, steal books and gather to discuss them over cafe con leche at dingy restaurants in the city\u2019s downtown area.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe pleasure we take in this, as readers of English, owes everything, of course, to the book’s talented translator, Natasha Wimmer, who repeatedly finds inspired English solutions for what must be a fiendishly chatty and slangy novel,\u201d said the New York Times review of the 2007 translation.<\/p>\n
Wimmer moved to Mexico City while translating the book. She rented an apartment near one of the protagonists\u2019 favorite coffee shops\u2014it is a very geographically minded book, explains Wimmer, so understanding the neighborhood\u2019s layout was important\u2014and met with student fans of Bola\u00f1o to discuss the meaning of the book\u2019s slang.<\/p>\n
Still, when she was three-quarters of the way through translating the novel, Wimmer decided to start over; she felt as if her sentence breaks were too different from Bola\u00f1o\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn general, capturing the rhythm in a new language is the hardest thing to do, and it\u2019s also the most important thing to do. You can\u2019t be carried away by a novel unless you are caught up into the sweep of the language,\u201d says Wimmer.<\/p>\n
Since then, Wimmer has been translating nonstop, and she is hoping for the opportunity to translate a female writer soon.<\/p>\n
Both Grossman and Wimmer have dabbled in creating their own original writing, with mixed success.<\/p>\n
Grossman says she devours novels, but whenever she sits down to write fiction, she condenses her words more and more until all that\u2019s left on the page is a poem. Years ago, Women\u2019s Glib, an anthology of humorous literature by women writers, included one of Grossman\u2019s poems.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was called \u2018Tuesday Dilemma\u2019 because I thought of the poem on a Tuesday,\u201d explains Grossman. Then she recites the poem from her chair.<\/p>\n
\u201cDr. Sizmor promises beautiful, clear skin
\nto every woman riding in this car
\nAnd the New York Times reports
\nthat cynics die much earlier by far than true believers.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd that\u2019s the poem,\u201d she says. It\u2019s the only one she has gotten published because, Grossman admits, she does not handle rejection well and prefers, therefore, to write for herself.<\/p>\n
Wimmer, too, felt compelled to write fiction early on but knew that she didn\u2019t have the gene for plot. In any case, \u201cworking in publishing in general made me very aware of the glut of fiction out there, just the huge quantity of fiction and the desire not to add anything unless it felt really urgent and essential.\u201d<\/p>\n
Instead, she has written essays and book reviews while preparing her translation seminars at Princeton and Columbia universities. Grossman also teaches at the latter, and this year, as an homage to Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, who died in April after battling cancer for years, she will teach two seminars on the writer in Manhattan.<\/p>\n
Falling in Love<\/strong><\/p>\nThe relationship between author and translator, even when the former is no longer alive, is profoundly intimate.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can tell I fell in love with Cervantes,\u201d says Grossman, blushing slightly. He \u201cmust\u2019ve been a fabulous man. I would\u2019ve loved to hang out with him. I would\u2019ve loved to have a meal and some wine and just talk to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
She talks about his life\u2014a soldier, Cervantes fought in the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, where he lost movement in his left hand; was taken captive shortly after; and then staged numerous escape attempts\u2014with the awe and pride of a mother talking about her child\u2019s triumphs.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe shadow of Cervantes is always there in Spanish,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s like a drumbeat in the back of everybody\u2019s head, even people who haven\u2019t read Don Quixote.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grossman\u2019s fascination with Cervantes is rivaled only by her love for Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez. She met him a handful of times, on several occasions at hotel restaurants in Manhattan, where the novelist and Grossman were joined by his wife. When she had questions about specific passages in the book, she would save them and then send Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez a long fax\u2014they had both just started to experiment with computers during Love in the Time of Cholera, says the translator.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt as if I knew him better than I actually knew him.\u2026 I was inside his head through each of the books that I translated,\u201d she says. Grossman describes Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez as a lovely, very smart, very funny, very witty man.<\/p>\n
Wimmer, likewise, feels as if she got to know Bola\u00f1o intimately, especially since much of The Savage Detectives is autobiographical. Translating Vargas Llosa gave her a deeper insight into his peculiarities, too. While working on one of his novels, she reached out to the writer to discuss some concerns.<\/p>\n
\u201cI spotted some inconsistencies in the story and I said, \u2018Well, you know, I could just make a little change here and this little change here,\u2019 and he said, \u2018No, I intended it to be that way,\u201d\u2019 says Wimmer with a giggle. \u201cBut he was very gracious,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n
For these translators, certain words are better left untouched, a kind of signature for particular authors. Wimmer, for example, left mano in The Savage Detectives. She said she could have translated it as dude or man but knew that neither stood for exactly what Bola\u00f1o intended.<\/p>\n
For Grossman, who doesn\u2019t translate street and church names, or se\u00f1or and se\u00f1orita, it was more about staying faithful to the language of the narrative in Love in the Time of Cholera. To accomplish that, she avoided using any contractions, thereby elevating the language of the narrative. She looked for an equivalent style in English and settled for 19th century writing, getting inspiration from the voices of Charles Dickens and Jane Austen.<\/p>\n
New York transplants, both women enjoy being at the heart of the publishing world. For Wimmer, who lives in Ditmas Park in Brooklyn, New York offers her opportunities she wouldn\u2019t have back home\u2014and a dash of celebrity, too.<\/p>\n
Wimmer recalls a time when she was recognized at a caf\u00e9 in her neighborhood. But, she explains, \u201cthat was a bit of a fluke. Don\u2019t make it sound like I\u2019m accosted, like I\u2019m fending off the paparazzi,\u201d she says with a laugh.<\/p>\n
She adds, \u201cA lot of translators enjoy being the power behind the throne.\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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