#katherine silver

[whilereadingandwalking]

My Tender Matador by Pedro Lemebel, translated by Katherine Silver, was a big surprise. In this book, the Queen of the Corner, an old “flaming” homosexual who lives life as a woman, harbors a young intellectual and radical, Carlos, and his plotting friends. As she nurses her crush on the much younger man, we get a 2nd narrative: Pinochet himself going about his daily life, usually being annoyed by the relentless chatter of his wife. 

This is a fantastic book that at first just seems like it’s capturing an old queen in love with a strapping young boy and reminiscing on her old days of cruising and finding her way. But the novel quickly grows from there. The machismo of a despotic government clashes and foils delightfully against our Queen’s uncontainable queerness, saying something both ironic and poignant about the cult of masculinity and the structure of the patriarchy. The Queen doesn’t want to know anything about politics, but the narrative shows quite clearly how much politics forces its way into everyone’s lives, every day, every hour, as state violence and surveillance continue to grow. 

Meanwhile, the book is an age gap romantic story done quite well. It has all the right moods of longing, nostalgia, hope, and sadness, and left me with a heart full of feelings. And it’s funny! The Queen is ridiculous—but is never reduced to caricature—and her story was hard to put down. 

Content warnings for homophobia, homophobic slurs, sexual assault and harassment, racism, misgendering.

[womenintranslation]

The Meaning of Isolation: On María Sonia Cristoff’s “Include Me Out” - Los Angeles Review of Books

Joel Pinckney reviews "Include Me Out," a novel by María Sonia Cristoff, translated from Spanish by Katherine Silver.

Los Angeles Review of Books: The Meaning of Isolation: On María Sonia Cristoff’s “Include Me Out”

[womenintranslation]

Bay Area, May 4

MAY 4, 2019 | 11:45AM - 1:00PM

Dance & Do Battle: Writers and Translators on Art and Activism

Tamalpais Room | Brower Center | 2150 Allston Way | Berkeley, California

These writers and translators engage with the world in ways that go well beyond the books they’ve published. Acclaimed translator Katherine Silver has aided families detained on the border in the convoluted process of applying for asylum. Aaron Coleman’s new book, “Threat Come Close,” takes on the policing of Blackness and masculinity. Innosanto Nagara’s “A is for Activist” books teach kids the art of resistance. In the words of poet D.A. Powell: “Remember the lesson of West Side Story: one can dance and do battle at the same time.”

Click here for tickets and more information.

[straydog733]

Reading Resolution: “Senselessness” by Horacio Castellanos Moya

2. A book written in Central America: Senselessness by Horacio Castellanos Moya, translated by Katherine Silver

List Progress: 7/30

Trigger warning for genocide, violence, sexual violence.

Wow, this book was a trip. I’m not even sure I can say that I liked Senselessness by Horacio Castellanos Moya, or that I would recommend it, but reading it was certainly exciting. Usually I am skeptical of prose with a heavy style of run-on sentences; I find it heavy and cloying (to the eternal frustration of my Faulkner-loving best friend). But Castellanos Moya’s work feels like it grabs you by the wrist and pulls you through every line, tying ideas together so quickly that you have no choice but to come along for the ride. Senselessness is rich, thrilling, and tense.

It is also intensely sexual, repellently violent and obscene. This book is a lot. More than anything, I can say that it is a lot.

Senselessness is the story of an unnamed writer in an unnamed Central American country who is hired to copyedit a one thousand one hundred page report on a government massacre of indigenous populations, funded and organized by the Catholic Church. Most of the report is made up of detailed testimonies of brutal murders, tortures and rapes, which the narrator becomes entranced with. Woven into his editing job is a personal story of his own professional disgrace, sexual pursuits and deteriorating mental health. The reader has very little way to know if his concerns about being hunted down by military agents are rational, inventions of his paranoia, or a combination of the two.

The narrator’s vulnerability is one of the only things that make him likeable, as other than that he is incredibly perverse, unpleasant and self-obsessed, especially when his struggles are directly and bluntly contrasted with the tragedies in the report. He is not a good man, he is not even working on the report out of some sense of altruism, but he is driven to both good and evil deeds by the madness around and inside him. The long sentences feel like his actual stream of consciousness, a spiraling account of madness in mad times.

Senselessness is not a pleasant or cozy read by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a fascinating and thrilling one. If you have a strong stomach and are in the mood for some very stylized prose, I would give it a shot. I don’t know how it reads in the original Spanish, but this work of Castellanos Moya’s and translation by Katherine Silver is a powerful work.

Would I Recommend It: Yes, with all of the caveats mentioned above.

[poetsandwriters]

When we translate, our performance is our reading/writing and our stage is the page...Can there ever be a definitive performance of Hamlet or a definitive translation of Rilke? I don’t think so, and how much poorer we would be if one could somehow be assumed or imposed.

Katherine Silver (Words Without Borders, 2012)

[translatable]

Great interview with Fiona McCrae, publisher at Gray Wolf Press.

Check out their amazing international list here. Their Spanish-English translation titles and translators feature the best of the best--Daniel Sada translated by Kate Silver, Forrest Gander's innovative bilingual presentation of his translations of the poetry of Mexican poet Pura López Colomé, Margaret Jull-Costa's translating of Bernard Atxaga. . . . 

[translatable]

Asymptote Spring issue is out, with a translation from Katherine Silver and an interview with Margaret Carson and Heather Cleary, among other stuff

The Spring 2014 Asymptote is out, and as usual, it's beautiful and full of an incredible assortment of contemporary literature written in English and in English translation, from Herta Muller, J.M. Coetzee, from the Japanese, Hungarian, Swedish, Russian, French, Arabic, and more. . . . 

From Spanish-language writers, there's fiction by Colombian writer Antonio Ungar, translated by Katherine Silver. I haven't read Ungar's work in Spanish, but I've never been disappointed with anything I've read in translation by Katherine Silver--she seems to always end up choosing writers for whom she's the perfect translator, and then turning in an interesting work of art in response. 

There's also an interview by Eric M.B. Becker with translators Margaret Carson and Heather Cleary, both of whom have translated work by Sergio Chejfec, among others. 

There's poetry in translation from Spanish poet Luis García Montero and from Uruguayan poet Dremko Candil. 

You can read all texts in their original language as well as in English translation, and as an added bonus, Asymptote has added audio as well.

Asymptote never disappoints--check out their Archive here.  

[msarki]

Senselessness by Horacio Castellanos Moya

Senselessness by Horacio Castellanos Moya, Katherine Silver (Translator) Paperback, 142 pages Published May 17th 2008 by New Directions (first published 2004) Original title:  Senselessness (New Directions Paperbook) ISBN:  0811217078 (ISBN13: 9780811217071) Edition language:  English

What I noticed almost from the very start of this book was that the character was going to be a familiar one to me.  Not so much a character I had already met in fiction but in truth a man I already knew to some degree in the work I last got a living from for over twenty-two years.  I wrote a film script titled Alphonso Bow several years ago and this character I knew in real life made his debut on the pages of my fiction.  The screenplay went on to be made into a film by my oldest son and enjoyed a nice run while traveling around the country being shown in several independent film festivals.  

This chief character in Senselessness is smarter than mine however, and more articulate.  His language is very sophisticated when sober, and he has been trained in writing so he speaks well on the page as narrator.  However, my guy and he are both flawed characters and really not too likable.  But I am drawn to these types of men.  I love having lunch with them and hearing them spew off about anything that might come into their minds.  For me, this is the most significant character trait these men have in common.  Whatever comes to mind gets spewed out of their mouths as if they had no filter in which to clean their thoughts or language before their spontaneous obstruction regurgitates.  The speed in which their minds and voices play out is dumbfounding to me, and purely entertaining.  I do not see my old friend much these days anymore because he tends to bore me.  Repeatedly different versions of the same story.  He would say we do not see each other because I no longer help him be employed.  But truthfully, as much as I do appreciate him, it is the same opinionated garbage continuously spewing forth from his mouth that I am literally sick in the face from.  

But I do like this book.  I am over halfway in and still feel it is relevant and extremely entertaining.  Unlike some others who have read it, I want it not to end. There is little about the man that endears me to him other than his extremely flawed opinions of women and sex and his mistrust of all those around him.  He is disparaging and judgmental, and actually someone I would probably not like if I had to deal with him on a daily basis or if I were expected to be his constant friend.  But I am not his friend.  I am only listening in to all his conversations and the rapid thoughts that race constantly through his mind.  So far, Moya has done an excellent job of keeping his own work contained within the framework of a somewhat raging lunatic.  Not an easy thing to do.  People resembling this chief character seem almost unreal because they become caricatures of what has seriously taken over their minds.  It is almost as if they cannot help themselves and are looking for somebody to save them.  Or at least listen to them releasing the tension that builds constantly and unforgivingly all through their busy minds.  They are unreal to those of us in more control of our own impulses.  But these people really do exist and I will be interested to see how Moya finishes this tale.  I am not going to compare Moya to Bernhard as there is really nobody like him.  There are plenty of writers who have invoked the spirit of Bernhard in their work.  But the challenge for me is in the character each writer develops and if they each have their own unique voice and ideas of the world even within the somewhat similar energetic rantings and ravings that can bring to mind a writer the likes and brilliance of Thomas Bernhard.         

I especially enjoyed what I thought was a well-made sex scene, nervous and as claustrophobic as can be, and almost totally unrewarding given the circumstances actually of her god-awful smelly feet and the soon-to-be-returning military boyfriend.  Again, the scene reminded me of my old friend Alphonso who cares only for his own needs being met and always finds fault with whomever (and the more the merrier) he is having sex with.  But this character in Moya's book is as well a nutcase surely, though highly educated and with gifts, and all the countless imaginings in his head are delightful for a person like me standing outside it and safely anchored in a warm house in a more-than-welcome neighborhood. 

With only three chapters remaining to read (out of the original twelve I began with) I cannot fathom Moya blowing this tale to smithereens.  There is tension, danger, and deceit; enough for all of us to mash our teeth on while waiting for more gore.  This is a lively novel, and perhaps because of its short length, a bit too small to be considered by those who count a masterpiece.  But I might have to differ upon completion of this book.  Of course, first I shall have to see if Moya succeeds in bringing this to a proper close, one that would bring justice to at least a few participants in this violent and quite nasty tale of control, and reeking of a vengeance unheard of since McCarthy's Blood Meridian.  This book is not for the faint-hearted or those who find it too uncomfortable reading about bloody massacres and machete-wielding tortures resulting in multiple severed appendages.

"I am not complete in the mind," are the first seven words of the very first sentence of this book.  I fathom now that Moya was originally speaking in a cleverly veiled way about his chief character instead of the chief character seemingly relating the words he had read in a one thousand one hundred page manuscript written as testimony by the Indian survivors of a brutal military dictatorship.  This chief character is evidently becoming extremely unraveled, and all is not what it seems, especially to him. Because of the deftness of the author Moya I am really not sure who to believe here.  I kind of think the chief character is on to something, but he certainly is a whacko supreme so I also have my doubts about the whole affair.  And add to the confusion that his "friend" Erick who got him the job in the first place with the archdiocese has not made any friendly appearance in which to add any credibility to our chief character's suspicions.  There is no proof at all that Erick is even a friend at all as the evidence does not support this general statement issued often from out of the mouth of this chief character who still has no name I am aware of.  

Late in these last chapters the chief character, an obvious alcoholic, has gone without any booze in his system for several days now due to the penicillin he is injecting because of the venereal disease he contracted recently from one of his female associates referred to in a paragraph above where I was praising a certain sex scene and all its implications excluding that one.  I am afraid the chief character is losing his mind.  He is definitely unhinged and hallucinating while feverishly attempting to complete his copy-editing of the one thousand one hundred page testimony.  By all accounts things are not looking promising for the chief character.  The anxiety is ramping up to dangerous levels, and without serious medication or some stiff drinks I am certain our character is going down for a very hard fall.

This was a crazily rewarding novel to read.  By all accounts somewhat political given the nature of that part of the world that Moya himself hails from though today it is said he resides in Iowa. And throughout this short book there was no in-your-face agenda, though exorbitantly extreme in its telling.  The violence provocatively real along with the sex, but our chief character's mind remains, it seems, forever obscurely fucked.  His relief is found in his wide abuse of alcohol, and certainly not in his remembering of the atrocities discovered in the thousand one hundred pages of testimony that will persist now until the end of time.