Translator, Poet, Writer, Editor
Sometimes linguistic differences represent cultural differences, and sometimes they don’t. I previously wrote a post about this topic concerning the lack of the word “excited” in French. Does the absence of an exact translation for “excited” mean that the French lack excitement? No. However, there are definitely cultural differences in how excitement is expressed. In…
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Last night, in the gilded reception room of the French Embassy, Négar Djavadi and her translator Tina Kover accepted the Albertine Prize for Disoriental, published by Europa Editions. From a shortlist of five novels published within the last year, readers had voted to give the award to Djavadi’s first novel, the tale of a young…
When people make claims that lexical differences between languages should be interpreted as cultural differences, a healthy dose of skepticism is usually in order. So when I saw an article on BBC.com titled “Why the French Don’t Show Excitement,” based on the untranslatability of the English word excited, I wasn’t sure if there’d be much…
Even under the pouring rain, Cannes is still Cannes, and the excitement is becoming palpable on this side of the pond as well. The festival opened yesterday, and in an article that I translated today for ARTINFO, journalist Damien Leblanc describes how holding umbrellas didn’t keep the crowd from cheering Leonardo DiCaprio and the cast…
