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Borges, in part to legitimize his own Europhilia, correctly pointed out that expecting writers to engage with these romantic nationalist tropes was arbitrary and limiting, a genre that was demonstrative of its own artificiality.

Adam Morris

The fiction I’ve written and published is certainly inflected by the work of authors I was reading or translating at the time.
ADAM MORRIS

Author Certainly Fiction Inflected Intense Published Reading Reading. Time Translate Work
Which sometimes forecloses their unique modernism and experience of modernization in favor of a mythic past or an artificially constructed ideal national subject.
ADAM MORRIS

Constructed Experience Modernization Mythic National Subject Unique
Some critics have commented that understanding the specific Brazilian political context of the novel is helpful for reading Quiet Creature. This may be true, but it’s not prerequisite for understanding it.
ADAM MORRIS

Context Critic Helpful Novel Political Prerequisite True Understanding
Once I looked into it, I was taken aback to learn that pretty much nothing by Joao Gilberto Noll was available in English translation.
ADAM MORRIS

Aback Available Determined Injustice Looked Nothing Pretty Taken
English can be tricky because there are so many false cognates, but sometimes, as long the idea conveyed is not wrong, these false cognates can themselves offer synonyms or lead to a better alternative word or phrase in translation.
ADAM MORRIS

Alternative Cognate Conveyed English False Idea Long Sometimes Tricky
The Argentine literary tradition was believed by many, including many Argentines, to be concerned with a national imaginary in which the gauchos and the pampas and the tango were fundamental tropes.
ADAM MORRIS

Concerned Country Fundamental Literary National Tango Tradition Trope
The Brazilian national identity is not one of João Gilberto Noll primary concerns. This does not mean social critique is absent: race, gender, and class relations are considered in Quiet Creature.
ADAM MORRIS

Concern Country Identity Mean National Primary Reading
I only translate authors whose work already interests me as a reader, and that’s a decision I make based on multiple encounters with an author’s work.
ADAM MORRIS

Already Author Decision Interest Multiple Reader Translate
Jorge Luis Borges had the soapbox and the authority to complain about this myopic understanding of the duty of Latin American writers
ADAM MORRIS

Authority Complain Football Latin Myopic People Soapbox Understanding Unique Writer
I have a few minor rules for myself but I break them all the time. For example, when translating from Romance languages to English, there is often a choice between a Latinate cognate and a Germanic equivalent.
ADAM MORRIS

Break Choices Dark Language Minor Myself Romance Rule Time Translating
An easy example would be the Portuguese escuridão:
ADAM MORRIS

Country Escuridao Example
Reading across three languages is a way for me to diversify my intake as a reader, not to tunnel into certain categories or demographics.
ADAM MORRIS

Across Category Demographic Diversity Intake Language Reader Reading Tunnel
This neglect of a very important Brazilian writer is, in my view, the result of Brazil’s relative isolation from what metropolitan tastemakers.
ADAM MORRIS

Important Isolation Neglect Relative Result Writer Writing
I realized I had some cultural capital to spend, and I wanted to use it to introduce another author who might be considered a risk by conventional publishers. Michael Noll was at the top of my list.
ADAM MORRIS

Author Capital Considered Cultural Introduce List Outset Realized Spend Top
So likewise in João Gilberto Noll, readers shouldn’t expect samba and Carnival and football. The Brazilian national identity is not one of his primary concerns.
ADAM MORRIS

Carnival Concern Football Identify Likewise National Noll Primary Reader Samba
And these are universal relational matters, not necessarily particular to any country.
ADAM MORRIS

Country Matter Necessarily Particular Relational Universal

Borges, in part to legitimize his own Europhilia, correctly pointed out that expecting writers to engage with these romantic nationalist tropes was arbitrary and limiting, a genre that was demonstrative of its own artificiality.

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Popular Authors

Borges, in part to legitimize his own Europhilia, correctly pointed out that expecting writers to engage with these romantic nationalist tropes was arbitrary and limiting, a genre that was demonstrative of its own artificiality.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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