“Our composite language”: WiT Interviews Translator Katy Derbyshire
A few weeks ago we spotlighted one of our favorite Women in Translation reads of 2018, Heike Geissler’s Seasonal Associate, in fellow WiT activist and translator extraordinaire Katy Derbyshire’s superb English rendition. Many of our readers know that as well as being one of the top German-to-English literary translators out there today, Katy was part of the team that initiated the newly inaugurated Warwick Prize for Women in Translation, whose third edition will open once again for submissions this spring.
We recently caught up with Katy to ask her a few questions about her superb Translator’s Note, in which she provides the fascinating backstory to the novel and to its translation and publication in English by Semiotext(e):
WiT: How did the Translator’s Note come about?
KD: I thought that seeing the book is about work, I could take the opportunity to describe my own. I toyed with the idea of mimicking Heike Geissler’s book and writing it in the second person—“You’re a translator, and you’re fortunate enough to love your job,” that kind of thing. Especially as Heike translates as well, from English into German . . . But that felt a little silly in the end so I stuck to a more traditional format, just keeping it plain and—I hope—clear for non-translators. I’m not the only translator to have realised that a translator’s note is useful to reviewers, giving them a little more background information and enhancing their understanding. I’m sure the book would have been reviewed anyway, but as you might have noticed, a few of the critics have drawn on what I wrote. Plus, of course, a note makes all of us translators a tiny bit more visible to our readers.
Did the publisher ask you to write it, or did you propose it yourself?
As it happened there was a clause in my contract that granted me the right to include a translator’s note. I assume that’s standard because semiotext(e) publish a lot of theory and non-fiction, and they didn’t specifically request one. But it set the ball rolling in my mind and seemed like a good opportunity. I don’t always write a translator’s note; sometimes the text doesn’t present the kind of challenges that might be of interest, sometimes I feel like it might spoil the “magic” of a particularly strong voice. But here it fitted well.
What I love about it is that you pull back the curtain to show what it means to translate—you’re not only doing dictionary work, far from it. For example, you say that as a translator you like to immerse yourself in another person’s writing and mimic it in your own language. In order to do that, since you’ve never worked at an Amazon fulfillment center, you dipped into an amazing trove of “Working at Amazon” videos on YouTube and listened to a range of people talk about working there. Getting those exact words and phrases right matters! I think that anyone who’s worked at an Amazon fulfillment center in the English-speaking part of the globe would agree that it's on the mark. Was achieving that one of the more complicated things about the translation?
It was, absolutely! That and working directly for an American publisher, when my English is very British. So those were the two things that most concerned me: How would an American say this? And how would an Amazon worker say this? I was lucky enough to be sharing a desk at the time with a very patient American friend, who kindly helped me to use “shopping cart” rather than “shopping trolley” and that kind of thing. The editor still had a bit of work to do on that front but I think it came out well. And then the online research was essential and eye-opening. I’m a big fan of that culture of sharing advice on YouTube, from makeup tutorials to DIY tips. It feels sincere and generous, and sometimes subversive. Anyone can have expert knowledge! Some of the Amazon fulfillment videos I found were made by people who were grateful to be working there and pleased to be given free pizza on long shifts, for example. Others were angry about how the company treated them but didn’t necessarily reflect on the system behind it. So that extra layer of perspective was fascinating and useful, and reminded me—although Heike says so herself—that a lot of people rely far more heavily on Amazon as an employer than she did, just working there to pay off her overdraft.
You say that Heike Geissler gave you the green light to add extra layers to the translation where you thought it was necessary, but you don’t identify these additions. I thought one added layer must have been about the word “tote,” which is Amazonspeak for the ubiquitous yellow crates used to hold products as they move on conveyor belts. By a remarkable coincidence, “tote” sounds like the word in German for death—ha! (But you don’t use the German word—Tod—which I found interesting). Can you give another example of what you added to the translation?
In that case, I left out the German word because, to a non-German-speaker, it doesn’t look like a homonym for tote, and I wanted to explain the odd reaction to the word but not add even more confusion. The other thing that springs to mind is that I added something to Heike’s initial description of herself—and therefore of you, as the reader who slips into her position through the narration. Here’s what it says now—everything from “Another important thing” is my addition:
From now on, you are me. That means you’re female; please don’t forget that because it’s important in places. You’re a writer and a translator, and at this point in life you have two sons and a partner who suits you well, something you’re usually aware of. Another important thing, which you rarely think about but which has to be said: You’re German, but the country you were born in no longer exists.
In this case, the book’s original readers can instantly place Heike geographically, because they know she’s in Leipzig in the former GDR. But I thought Anglophone readers might benefit from a little help. I added these interventions once I had a feel for our composite language, if you see what I mean—how Heike sounds in my English. And the book’s forthright style made that very easy to do. Obviously, I ran them by Heike too.
You write about the difficulties finding a publisher for the book in the US and UK. Do you think the Women in Translation problem had anything to do with that? I remember it was one of the books you listed in your LitHub post a few years ago on “10 German Books by Women We’d Love to See in English.”
I think there were a number of factors that made publishers cautious. Firstly, who wants to annoy Amazon these days? But also, the book is a long way from a conventional narrative. It’s a stylized account of Heike’s time working at Amazon, and it also explores broader ideas about paid labour and what it does to us. Yet it’s not a theoretical or philosophical book as such—it’s radically subjective. Hard to categorise, in other words! I’m only now thinking about whether gender played a role . . . Perhaps we unconsciously expect books about work to be written by men? Do we expect women to write about relationships, parenting, “soft subjects”? I’m not sure. At any rate, semiotext(e) came along and ignored all that. I’m really thrilled by the reactions and reviews—very exciting.
What are you working on now?
I’m finishing off a short story collection by Clemens Meyer for Fitzcarraldo Editions. Tomorrow I’m going to Leipzig to take a look at some of the stories’ real-life settings with the writer and his Italian translator, Roberta Gado. That’s the huge advantage of living in the same country as the writers I translate. I have to admit I took a longer break than usual between first translating the stories and finishing off, so I’m excited to be returning to them with a fresh viewpoint. They’re gorgeous, crazy and sad. This is the first time I’ve cried at my computer while translating.
What books are on your nightstand?
Too many! Here’s a photo . . . As it turns out, there’s only one male writer (and two anthologies) among them. Yay me.