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 ]
Greta Thunberg’s "raw and powerful" family story, written largely by her mother Malena Ernman, will be published by Allen Lane on 5th March. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-02-18 15:10:37 UTC ]
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It’s hard enough for memoir writers to figure out their relationship to “truth.” Our memories are faulty, and our real lives rarely offer tightly-plotted stories or clear lessons—so is your responsibility to the reader to be scrupulously accurate, or to give them some kind of insight into... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-02-18 12:00:00 UTC ]
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R. Eric Thomas’ debut memoir Here for It: Or How to Save Your Soul in America challenges what it means to be “other.” Thomas delves into his experiences as a black, queer Christian—moving from his childhood in Baltimore to his struggles with private school and an Ivy League. This hilarious... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-02-18 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Picador is publishing The Running Book: A Journey through Memory, Landscape and History by Irish Book Award-winner John Connell. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-02-16 17:12:56 UTC ]
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His diverse body of work included novels, plays and a memoir about Ernest Hemingway. He was also a partner with his friend Paul Newman in business and charity. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-02-16 15:37:39 UTC ]
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His diverse body of work included novels, plays and a memoir about Ernest Hemingway. He was also a partner with his friend Paul Newman in business and charity. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-02-15 21:06:55 UTC ]
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TO BE A STRANGER in your own land is alienating enough, but to be a stranger among your own people? That vexing question is at the heart of two books — one a Bildungsroman, the other a memoir — by Arab authors whose narratives might be best described as the misadventures of the insider-outsider.... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books
[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-02-15 18:00:32 UTC ]
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IF YOU WERE a depressed young woman in the 1990s, Elizabeth Wurtzel’s memoir Prozac Nation (1994) was required reading. I remember standing in a New Jersey Barnes & Noble, tenderly taking the book from the shelf, and turning it over in my hands. Who was this woman on the cover? She looked so... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books
[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-02-14 13:30:58 UTC ]
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Free agent NFL quarterback and social activist Colin Kaepernick plans to publish a memoir via his own publishing venture and release an audiobook version of the untitled book via an exclusive deal with Audible. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-02-14 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Shetland literature has a short history. Or, more accurately, the long history of Shetland literature has been truncated — the result of a double disadvantage, as far as official histories are concerned: an oral culture, in which few people could read or write, and a language that died out... Continue reading at British Council global
[ British Council global | 2020-02-13 12:54:04 UTC ]
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Colin Kaepernick announced on Thursday that he will release a memoir this year under his new imprint, Kaepernick Publishing. He also has partnered with Audible for a multiproject deal. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-02-13 12:35:32 UTC ]
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This week on The Maris Review, R. Eric Thomas joins Maris Kreizman to discuss his new book, Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America. On choosing the moments that go into a memoir: Maris Kreizman: Your memoir collection is very much about figuring out who you are and being comfortable... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-02-13 09:47:59 UTC ]
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Explorer and biologist Roman Dial reflects on parenting in this memoir of the search for his son, who vanished while solo hiking in Costa Rica. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-02-12 23:38:32 UTC ]
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Explorer and biologist Roman Dial reflects on parenting in this memoir of the search for his son, who vanished while solo hiking in Costa Rica. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-02-12 23:38:32 UTC ]
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The pop star-turned-fashion mogul was always defined by men. Now, she’s defining herself. Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2020-02-11 13:43:43 UTC ]
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Adrienne Miller’s memoir chronicles her tenure as fiction editor of Esquire in the 1990s and her rocky relationship with David Foster Wallace, the era’s iconic novelist. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-02-11 10:00:07 UTC ]
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When you’re writing a memoir, you find that you’re obliged to confront your own ideas about the nature of memory. In Gore Vidal’s own splendid memoir Palimpsest, he suggests that when we remember an event, we don’t remember it as it actually happened, but rather that we remember our memory of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-02-11 09:48:31 UTC ]
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Vivian Gornick and the revolution that won’t end: John Freeman profiles the author of Unfinished Business. | Lit Hub “What are we to do with the art of profoundly compromised men?” Zan Romanoff on Adrienne Miller’s memoir of life with literary men, including David Foster Wallace. | Lit Hub “It... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-02-10 09:49:30 UTC ]
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From Secret Barristers to pseudonymous paramedics and White House moles, Anon is writing a lot of books these days – and identifying some unexpected truths“For most of history, Anonymous was a woman,” wrote Virginia Woolf. Today, Anonymous is probably an outraged employee in a public service: a... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-02-10 00:00:19 UTC ]
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In her new memoir "Open Book," singer and former reality-TV star Jessica Simpson opens up about sexual abuse, addiction and dating John Mayer. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-02-05 14:54:55 UTC ]
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