" everything he wrote is gold " : an interview with gabriel garcía márquez' s translator.

The Washingon Post  (usa)
     wp. OPINIONS


                               " everything he wrote was gold ":
                                an interview with gabriel garcía márquez' s translator
                                by Carlos Lazada,  Published: April 19- E-mail the writer




As a translator, it may not get better -- or  more daunting -- than bringing the work of Gabriel García Márquez to new audiences.  Begining with the 1885  novel ' Love in the Time of Cholera'  Edith Grosman  has rendered in English  the Nobel  laureate' s work. In an e-mail echange with Outlook editor Carlos Lazada following the writer' s death on Thursday, Grossman reflects on the art of translation, Gabriel García Márquez' s pet peeves and which of his novel was her favorite.

When did you learn Spanish ?

I first studied Spanish in high school in Philadelphia.  My family were not Spanish speakers. 

How did you become a translator ?

A friend who edited  magazine asked me to translate a piece by the Argentine Macedonia Fernandez.  When I said that I was a critic, not a translator, he said, " You can call yourself whatever you want, just translate this piece ". I did, and the rest is history.

How involved was Gabriel García Márquez in the work of translation ?

He was not particularly engaged in the process on the other hand, I normally don' t consult with an author until  I ' ve finished the translation.  I usually take about six month to do a novel, depending on its length and difficulty.

Did he have any ruler about how he wanted his work translated ?

He did not like adverbs that ended in- mente ( in Spanish, the English equivalent is- ly)
 I sometimes felt like a contortionist as I searched out alternatives.

Which work of his did you find the hardest to translate ?

Everything the wrote was gold. They were all wonderful to work on;  I can' t say which was the most difficult.  

Do you regret not translating " One Hundred Years "?

 Yes, of course. I wish  I' d translated " One Hundred Years ". I wish  I' d translated everything he ever wrote 

You 've said that translation is not about creating an equivalent text from one language to another but that it is a " rewriting of the first text ". What did you mean by that ?

Translating means expressing an idea or a concep in a way that' s entirely different from the original, since each language is a seperate system.  And so, in fact, when I translate a book written in Spanish,  I' m  actually writing another book in English .

Did you feel you had to get into Gabriel García Márquez head to understand what he meant to convey ?

I' ve always felt that you get inside an author' s head by translating his or her work and begining to see the world through the writer' s eyes.  Everything you need to know about an author is the writing.

As a reader, do you have a favorite Gabriel García Márquez novel ? 

I think my favorite may be " Love the Time of Cholera ".

You also translated his memoir " Living to tell the Tale" .  How different is it to translate fiction and  memoir ?

I didn' t  approach the memoirs differently from the fiction.  He used to say that writing journalism and writing fiction are on the same continuum, and he didn' t differentiate them in any hard-and- fast way .

What do you make of the "magic realism" label.  Is that the right way to think of Gabriel Garcia Márquez work ?

I don' t think the term " magic realism" is especially helpful.  All fiction' s is made believe that comes out of the imagination and fantasty of the writer.  Fictional worlds may use elements of realitty,but they are the products of an indivdual mind. 

You' ve also translated Cervantes' s " Don Quixote " ?

When Gabriel García Márquez heard that I was going to translate "Don Quixote", he said,
 " Dicen que me esta' s pomiendo  cuernos can Cervantes ". -- " I heard you' re two-timing me with Cervantes. " Brillant".

Who are the young novelists writing in Spanish today that you are of admire ?

I' m very fond of the work of Santiago Roncagliolo, a Peruvian who currently lives in Barcelona.

What do English speakers miss by reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez work in English . What is lost in translation ?

I try not to think about is lost but what is gained.  For the reader who does' nt know Spanish, this a chance to read books that otherwise would be out of reach;  for English,  translation adds to the expressive capability of the language by introducing elements that right not have been there otherwise .

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       ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Gabriel José de la Concordia Garciá Márquez, ( 6 March 1927- 17 April 2014) was a Columbia novelist, short story writer, screenwriter and journalist known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America.  Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century, he was awarded the 1982 Nobel Prize Literature. He pursued a self-directed education that resulted in his leaving law school for a cereer in journalism.  From early on, he showed no inhibitious in his critism of Colombian and foreign politics. In 1958 he married Mercedes Barcha, they had two sons, Rodrigo and Gonzalo.
Garcia Márquez started as a journalist, and wrote many,  acclaimed non-fiction works and short stories, but is best known for his novel such as " One Hundred Years of Solitude" ( 1967),
 " The Autumn of the Patriarch" ( 1975) and " Love in The Time of Cholera"(1985). His works have achieved significant widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style labeled as " magic realism ", which uses magical elements and events in otherwise ordinary and realistic situations. Some of his works are set in a fictional village called " Macondo"
( the town mainly inspired by his birthplace " Aracartaca' and most of them explore the theme of 'solitude'.       WIKIPEDIA .