Exophony 3

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In Exophony 1 and 2, I blabbed about what exophony is and reviewed a short list of writers who found themselves in a different language. Which means I’m not all lost writing in this terrible language.

Today I’ll only quote a bit of Chantal Wright’s essay «Exophony and literary translation. What it means for the translator when a writer adopts a new language^[1]«. Where she rationalizes about OWNING A LANGUAGE.

«When deliberating on the title of this essay, I initially considered calling it ‘On writing in a language which is not one’s own and what this means for the translator’. But to do so would be to uphold two stubborn myths: one, that a language belongs to a certain territory and body of people, which in fact no language does…»

German is spoken in Austria and Switzerland (besides Germany), English… that’s spoken even in my municipality. Yes, native speakers. Morocco, Switzerland and Quebec in Canada do parle le français. Portuguese is carioca too!

It might not be the everyday thing we speak or think; OURS BY CHOICE OR FORCE. Of the 62 native languages in Mexico, I speak none. I’m a child of the conquest^[2]…

EXOPHONIC WRITERS THAT MIGHT NOT BE ON THE LIST

The Wikipedia listing is longer than what I initially thought. Don’t stop there. It is an old phenomenon. Authors like Flavius Josephus^[3]. He didn’t make the list in spite of starting life as Yosef to end up being Titus when he was taken as an interpreter slave.

Maybe there are authors who were exophonous without anyone realizing! Or because no one knew much about them. Think a Mr. “No one really knows his real name” who wrote <<Una canasta de cuentos mexicanos>>. It is said he came from the States^[4] as German or Polish or who knows where from. Spanish wasn’t his native tongue, for sure.

Hereby we are left with an undetermined number of exophonic writers. Interesting eh?

DOES ONE CHANGE LANGUAGE ONLY WITH MIGRATION?

No. It can be a retail strategy. More readers, although more competition.

IT IS POSSIBLE TO FEEL FREER IN A DIFFERENT LANGUAGE.

For Aga Lesiewicz, English was a more honest way to express herself, giving her the confidence and changing her on the way.

I prefer it because I can attain a certain musicality I wouldn’t in Spanish.Besides, it forces me to think as the character. Not what I think or want out of the situation. Why do you think the blog was born in Spanish. Just a bloody journal about what I discover about writing fiction and the noise it buzzes in my head.

To others, it is just a way to disguise themselves. To experiment with their own identity or learn to survive in their new environment. Nabokov went out riding buses to write Lolita in the right colloquial English.

We write in a different language because it makes us happy too. Prejudices or not.

DO WE WRITE WELL?

I’ve only read Gibran and Kundera^[5]…in Spanish. Never in the original language. Both are great.

Me? I gotta think I do. Otherwise, I should just give up the blog and life altogether (no job, not published, just doing this cause I care for it more than I care about other stuff^[6]).

Would you try? Against any prediction or prejudice?

Have fun writing in your own or whatever language you have chosen/are forced to write in. Pasto kalo.

^[1] Wright, Chantal (2010) Exophony and literary translation: what it means for the translator when a writer adopts a new language. Target, 22 (1). pp. 22-39. Quotation found in https://benjamins.com/online/target/articles/target.22.1.03wri ; the original can be read through a 300 euro subscription so, no thanks.

^[2] If you are thinking it is thanks to you. No. It is because of you. Not the same. Be conscientious. Just that. Thank you.

^[3] Josephus, Flavius /dʒəʊˈsiːfəs/ ( c. 37– c. 100), Jewish historian, general, and Pharisee; born Joseph ben Matthias . His Jewish War gives an eyewitness account of the events leading up to the Jewish revolt against the Romans in 66, in which he was a leader.

^[4] I remember some museum exhibition that featured the guy as a part of the display (don’t ask what was the title or the artist on display since I don’t remember that, nor the museum) in which it was implied he came to Mexico after passing through the States where he changed his name to Bruno Traven —maybe I’m just adding more gossip to it for my memory is not photographic— from Red Marut and even before Red Marut; there seemed to have been other changes, The point is, NO ONE KNOWS WHERE HE IS FROM, THUS NO ONE KNOWS WHAT HE ORIGINALLY SPOKE.

^[5] Read The unbearable lightness of being, originally written in Czech (his mother tongue), a language I wouldn’t even dare to mess with.

^[6] Hence, I’m a nobody. I’m useless to you if you send me your baby manuscript for me to read and promote. It’s me who needs you. Sorry.