Lost in Translation: An Illustrated Collection of Beautiful Untranslatable Words Around the Globe
With a strong desire for wanderlust, writer and illustrator Ella Frances Sander decided to share her exciting findings on culture and language in her book Lost in Translation: An Illustrated Compendium of Untranslatable Words from Around the World.
Composed of charming and quirky illustrations, Lost in Translation showcases a list of untranslatable words missing in the English language, which have humorous, candid and interesting definitions. Among our favorites is the Brazilian word “saudade”, which means to run your fingers through your lover’s hair, the Japanese word “tsundoku,” which defines a collection of bought books waiting to be read, and the Tagalog word “kilig,” which is best described as the sensation of having butterflies in your stomach from a romantic experience. Sanders notes in the introduction of her book:
“The words in this book may be answers to questions you didn’t know to ask, and perhaps some you did. They might pinpoint emotions and experiences that seemed elusive or indescribable, or they may cause you to remember a person you’d forgotten. If you take something away from this book … let it be the realization or affirmation that you are human, that you are fundamentally, intrinsically bound to every single person on the planet with language and feelings.”
Although the designs are delightful and tender, the words have a larger purpose other than entertainment; they reveal insight and knowledge into different cultures’ expression and education of feelings and psychology. Overall Lost in Translation is an artistic meditation on one of humanity’s most complex and most beautiful divisions, which is language.
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