On Translation Browsing a Copenhagen airport bookstore, a translator picks up a book. The journey between that impulse and his eventual translation of the memoir into English was both emotional and serendipitous. In the summer of 2016 I was passing through Kastrup Airport in Copenhagen with my wife, on our way home after a visit with family. We stopped to browse the bookstore, and I noticed a reprint of a book by Danish author Tove Ditlevsen called Gift, which had first been published in 1971. I hadn’t read much of her work, but I knew she was a big name, so I bought it, even though the cover was strange, a psychedelic skull on a gray background. It did not take more than a couple of sittings to devour this memoir of Tove Ditlevsen’s life from the ages of about twenty-three to thirty-five. It chronicles her rise as a best-selling author, while she also had four failed marriages, two back-alley abortions, and a five-year near-fatal addiction to the opioid Demerol. I distinctly remember laying the book down after the final page and thinking to myself, I think this is a masterpiece. This was an intuitive judgment, not a conclusion I had come to after analyzing the text. But looking back now, I think what caused me to deem this work a masterpiece is the combination of Ditlevsen’s writing style, which is concise, honest, and ironic, combined with the content of her story, which through her many troubling experiences pulls back the... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'
[ World Literature Today | 2021-04-06 13:12:22 UTC ]
“Still, the best, most generative conversations mostly happen out of the public eye.” Wayne Miller on the hazards of talking poetry on social media. | Lit Hub As Gabriel Byrne watches his father’s decline, he wonders if it’s ever possible to be truly honest with himself. | Lit Hub Memoir “It... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-13 11:30:54 UTC ]
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Michael Patrick F. Smith’s “The Good Hand” is a memoir about grinding work in the last days of the Bakken oil boom. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-02-12 10:00:02 UTC ]
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Notes on Grief will recount the life of ‘a remarkable man of kindness and charm’ and the author’s struggle to absorb his loss during lockdown last yearChimamanda Ngozi Adichie has written a memoir about the sudden death of her father in lockdown last year. Notes on Grief, by the Orange... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-02-11 14:18:53 UTC ]
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TOVE DITLEVSEN’S first novel, A Child was Harmed, was sent back from the publisher with the accusation that she had “been reading too much Freud.” But Ditlevsen says she didn’t know who Freud was, a declaration that, 200-plus pages into her three-part memoir — a clear-eyed exploration of the... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books
[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2021-02-10 13:30:35 UTC ]
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Patricia Lockwood followed up on her memoir “Priestdaddy” with “No One Is Talking About This,” a novel that explores the chaotic feel of the internet and the pain of personal loss. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-02-10 10:00:17 UTC ]
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Beloved Mexican-American actor and restauranteur Danny Trejo’s first memoir, Trejo: My Life of Crime, Redemption, and Hollywood—which details Trejo’s path from drug addiction and incarceration in some of America’s most notorious prisons (including San Quentin, Folsom, and Soledad), to unexpected... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-09 21:03:44 UTC ]
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An excerpt from “Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted,” by Suleika Jaouad Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-02-09 16:17:10 UTC ]
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A list of nonfiction Black history books you can read this month to learn more about the history of racism and being Black in the U.S., including Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2021-02-09 11:31:00 UTC ]
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In his new memoir, “Gay Bar,” Jeremy Atherton Lin documents his personal history and the history of queer identity by exploring gay bars around the world. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-02-09 10:00:09 UTC ]
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In her new memoir coming out Tuesday, actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas recalls the pressure she felt to conform to the film industry's beauty standards. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-02-08 23:44:01 UTC ]
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In a memoir about family and identity, Danielle Geller uses her archival skills to create a portrait of her absent mother. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2021-02-05 15:52:48 UTC ]
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In a memoir about family and identity, Danielle Geller uses her archival skills to create a portrait of her absent mother. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2021-02-05 15:52:48 UTC ]
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“I needed help because I was the one who carried the psychic burden of our home, its physical state, all the time.” Laura Cronk considers ghosts and the gendered work of cleaning house. | Lit Hub Memoir Russell Shorto on realizing that his grandfather was a small-town mobster and (reluctantly)... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-05 11:30:52 UTC ]
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Peepal Tree Press is behind the dark, magical realist novel that scooped the £30,000 Costa Book of the Year last week, with The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey putting a new spotlight on a small publisher that has consistently supported international Caribbean writing for 35 years. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-04 21:20:53 UTC ]
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President Biden’s oldest surviving child is publishing a memoir about his struggles with addiction and drug abuse. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-02-04 18:54:06 UTC ]
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Son of US president, and ongoing target for conservatives, will release Beautiful Things in AprilHunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden and an ongoing target for Republican supporters, has announced that his memoir, Beautiful Things, will be published in April. Related: Joe, Jill and the... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-02-04 16:59:48 UTC ]
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Today the Associated Press reported that Hunter Biden, son of famous memoirist Joe Biden, will publish a memoir of his own on April 6. The memoir will be published with Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. Beautiful Things, acquired by Gallery Books in fall 2019, focuses on Biden’s... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-04 16:02:23 UTC ]
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Award-winning actress Cicely Tyson's memoir "Just as I Am" was published two days before her death. Now it's topping the bestseller lists. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-02-04 16:00:34 UTC ]
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Michelle Obama's bestselling memoir Becoming will be published in paperback on 2ndMarch, alongside an edition for younger readers. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-03 06:18:31 UTC ]
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Michelle Obama’s 'Becoming' will be released in a young reader’s edition and in trade paperback on March 2; originally published in 2018, the former First Lady’s memoir became a #1 international bestseller, with sales topping more than 15 million copies worldwide. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-02-03 05:00:00 UTC ]
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