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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

When I think about literature, I think about it in the three languages I read easily – English, Spanish, and Portuguese.
ADAM MORRIS

Country English Language Literature Portuguese Spanish Think Three
If João Gilberto Noll were writing in French or German or even Russian, it’s likely he’d be more broadly translated.
ADAM MORRIS

Broadly Country Likely Noll People Translated Writing
Strength and power in fiction is being able to resist these intoxicating voices, recognizing that they are the signatures of other writers and not one’s own.
ADAM MORRIS

Fiction Intoxicating Own Power Progress Recognizing Resist Signature Strength Voice Writer
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
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
This makes his writing very pleasing to read: João Gilberto Noll pays attention to detail, but only to certain details. And it’s never easy to foresee which details will send the narrator or the plot in an unsuspected direction.
ADAM MORRIS

Attention Easy Make Pleasing Read Writing
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
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
I don’t think there’s anything that I would call essentially Brazilian in João Gilberto Noll work. In that regard, it translates very well to a cosmopolitan audience.
ADAM MORRIS

Anything Audience Cosmopolitan Essentially Noll Regard Think Translate Work
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
I translated the novel and still it remains a mystery as to how exactly how this works. Noll thinks more like an experimental filmmaker than a novelist.
ADAM MORRIS

Exactly Experience Filmmaker Mystery Novelist Think Translate Work
Even my editor at Melville House, who championed the project form the outset, told me she was surprised by the response. After this, editors began asking my opinion about which Latin American writers ought to be translated.
ADAM MORRIS

Championed Editor Hoise Opinion Outset Response Surprise Translated
I was confident that I could find an editor and the readership for a translation
ADAM MORRIS

Confident Editor Readership Translation
With My Dog-Eyes by Hilda Hilst got more exposure and reached far more readers than I ever expected.
ADAM MORRIS

Expected Exposure Far House Latin Reached Reader Risk
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
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

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

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

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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