F  L  A  U  N  T

I’m sitting at a desk—my laptop on one side, and a crumpled paperback copy of the novel I’m in the thick of translating from Italian to English on the other. The two objects represent the two languages, and the distance that still separates them. The words of the language experimentation collaborative, Antena, are ringing in my head: _“Translation is an asymptote: no matter how close we try to get, there’s always a space.”_ _L’Agnese va a morire_, the novel in front of me, is drawn from the story of a Northern Italian woman who joined the partisan movement. The account was written by her friend, Renata Viganò, another _partigiana_. Through the text, the two women are in conversation with one another, and now my translation adds another voice to the mix. I’m staring at a passage where the author describes the character’s state of panic. “_Guardava intorno sperando che fosse come quando di notte si sta per cadere da una montagna e ci si sveglia nel letto._” The phrase effortlessly describes the character’s hope that she’ll soon wake up and discover that the events of the day were all a dream. There’s a natural rhythm to it. The author chose to use the third person neutral, which would loosely translate in English to “She was looking around, hoping that it would be as when, at night, in the moment before falling from a mountain, one awakes in one’s own bed.” This English feels too wordy and distant. No immediacy or rhythm. The rendition sounds strange, the phrases still stuck in the space that exists between the two languages. After many crossed-out drafts, I settle on my own version: _“She looked around, hoping for one of those moments in which she’d wake up in her bed at night after nearly falling from a mountaintop.”_ The journey from one to the other often seems impossible. The title itself poses an unsolvable challenge, starting with protagonist’s name, Agnese. Should the name itself be translated? That seems like a betrayal. There’s also an article in the mix, “_la,”_ a prefix used in northern Italian dialect before a person’s name. This addition would be meaningless when translated, and so I leave this strand, this “untranslatable,” behind. I type, backspace, and retype, oscillating back and forth between potential thoughts and unequivocal errors. After leaving mysterious passages blank, I flip through a thesaurus and second-guess myself over the clearest choice for rare and archaic words like _lavatoio_ (wash house) and _cavedagna_ (a term for a specific kind of small, dirt road). I print out first and second drafts of a single page of writing, only to look over and cross out words and sentences that no longer make sense once spit out on to a sheet of 8.5 x 11 paper. The closer I get to crafting the smoothest, most intelligible version of the page, the further its meaning slips away from me. Writers are translators, surreptitious figures who transpose people, experiences, and emotions into phrases that allow them to reappear on the page. But what about the people who carry those writers’ words over from one language to another—the translators behind the translators? What about the many men and women who’ve taken it upon themselves to translate Homer’s _Odyssey_? The job of the literary translator seems simple on the surface: a matter-of-fact convergence, a mirror. But what about the words that have no linguistic equivalence? How can a person effectively convey the humor, double-meanings, and dialects inherent to one language into another? How do you approximate someone else’s style, tone, and voice? _“She looked around, longing to wake in her own bed after falling from great heights.”_ Translation is a mystery, an enigmatic puzzle. It’s been described by those who practice it as performance, synesthesia, and transhumance. An otherworldly dialogue. The novel sitting in front of me was written 70 years ago, and its author left this world nearly 30 years later. My initial presumption of understanding starts to feel inane. How could I possibly assume to know what a writer meant to say without ever being able to speak to her directly, in person? While I translate, I’m in conversation with the writer. As I read and cross-reference, I start to assemble a response to the words in front of me. In revising draft upon draft, I start my own ghostly exchange. The words on the page are living, kinetic. They speak to each new reader. Through every visitation, they whisper the potential of a fresh interpretation. When a translator wanders through the spectral rooms of another author’s language, they might just come across an undiscovered corner. There’s a weight to what’s written, and what’s left unspoken. Words have many meanings, sometimes contradictory. Sometimes translation means pulling a comb through a knotted tapestry of possible solutions, and getting tangled in the threads. According to poet and translator Don Mee Choi, “Translation is in a perpetual state of being wrong,” and perhaps that sentiment is the key to understanding why anyone would embark on its journey in the first place. Sometimes translation means accepting the knot, and rejecting the smoothest, most aesthetically acceptable presentation of a phrase. _“Translation is an asymptote: no matter how close we try to get, there’s always a space. The space where we transpose, or are transposed.”_ This last thought is important. The journey is a conversation that takes place in between two points. As the translation continues, the conversation evolves and expands. In the beginning, the translator speaks to the author, pouring over their work and highlighting any clues that might shed light on its meaning. When a phrase or piece of dialect remains indecipherable, they call family members and friends who know the original language better than they ever could. The once-solitary venture becomes a communal effort. My over-the-phone conversations with my grandmother are an exercise in auto-translation, as I mentally shift words from her dialect, to Italian, to English. Each conversation, with a text or a living relative, represents a link to another world in which I’m a guest, a passing traveler. These exchanges represent an idea—a new, unique point of view. There can never be a single, inarguably correct story. It would be impossible to cross over from one language to another with every single word still intact and in place. A word-for-word, carbon copy of the original would be completely illegible. Every new translation of a novel or poem is a new thread, a new angle in a prismatic story. Keeping this in mind, I wander forward in my perpetual state of error, and try to accept my inevitable mistakes. I allow myself to be transposed by the open book in front of me, and the greater knowledge of those who’ve tried to answer my questions. After many phone calls, and weighing of words, I close the book, feeling like I’ve finally reached the final version, a unique interpretation. After all these efforts, I end up on the other side, a single page in hand.