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Jorge Luis Borges had the soapbox and the authority to complain about this myopic understanding of the duty of Latin American writers

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
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
Which sometimes forecloses their unique modernism and experience of modernization in favor of a mythic past or an artificially constructed ideal national subject.
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Constructed Experience Modernization Mythic National Subject Unique
One that actually relates to all Latin American literature: that is, not every author is interested in being a representative of his or her national culture on the global stage.
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Actually Author Country Culture Every Interested Literature Relate Represent
I am not one of those translators who think that working closely with the writer will yield the best translation.
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Best Closely Think Thinking Translation Translator Working Writer Yield
The transcendent aspect of the psychedelic experience is totally absent.
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Absent Aspect Experience Psychedelic Totally Transcendent
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
This neglect of a very important Brazilian writer is, in my view, the result of Brazil’s relative isolation from what metropolitan tastemakers.
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Important Isolation Neglect Relative Result Writer Writing
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.
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Exactly Experience Filmmaker Mystery Novelist Think Translate Work
The authors I prefer are all very different and are not limited to certain genres or even certain time periods.
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Author Certain Different Genre Limited Period Prefer
Unless you count the political backdrop, which in any case is a familiar one to many international readers
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Backdrop Count Familiar International Political Reader Thinking Unless
I am surprised by the word psychedelic. João Gilberto Noll does not accept realism in a straightforward way, but I am more inclined to call Quiet Creature a realist text than I am to call it a psychedelic one.
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Accept Psychedelic Quiet Realist Straightforward Surprise Way Word
English offers both obscurity and dark or darkness, and some translators will tell you the Latinate word is generally reserved for poetic and figurative expressions, while the Germanic word is used for colloquial and idiomatic use.
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Both Darkness English Idiomatic Obscurity Offer Reserved Translator Use
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.
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Carnival Concern Football Identify Likewise National Noll Primary Reader Samba
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.
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Concerned Country Fundamental Literary National Tango Tradition Trope
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

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Jorge Luis Borges had the soapbox and the authority to complain about this myopic understanding of the duty of Latin American writers

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