Ashok Ferry on writing Sri Lanka and his younger selves
“This society is fragmented – it’s a product of colonialism, but it’s also just a fact of paradise island.”
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“It’s the language of the colonizer” – An interview with jarral Boyd about indigeneity and language
jarral Boyd grew up on Turtle Island and is the child of Indigenous and Black parents. Since they have lived in Berlin, jarral has worked in schools, created community structures for diversity and inclusion, given workshops as an allyship trainer at conferences…
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“People are read differently depending on where they are”: A conversation with Raphaëlle Red on the principle of the road novel
Raphaëlle Red is an author currently living in Berlin who writes in French, German and English. She is also doing her PhD on literature in the African diaspora. We had the pleasure of speaking with her about her French-language debut novel Adikou, its protagonist’s journey and its context from one language to the next. The German translation of the novel by Patricia Klobusiczky was published in September 2024 by Rowohlt Verlag.
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From Text Choice to the Individual Word – the Political Decisions of a Translator
Within the framework of the Resonance program organized by the Goethe-Institutes in France, Justine Coquel and Anna von Rath chatted with Lucie Lamy, who, together with Jean-Philippe Rossignol, translated May Ayim’s works into French.
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Author meets translator: a conversation with Sharon Dodua Otoo and Jon Cho Polizzi
On 07 March 2024, we held our Author Meets Translator event with Sharon Dodua Otoo and Jon Cho Polizzi. Together we talked about the novel Adas Raum (Ada’s Room/Ada’s Realm), narrative perspectives, dialect and humour.
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“Women have always written”: An interview with Magda Birkmann
In Rowohlt Verlag’s newly launched series, rororo Entdeckungen, Magda Birkmann and Nicole Seifert select novels by remarkable but forgotten female authors from the twentieth century for publication. Last week we had the pleasure of talking to Magda Birkmann about this series and the novel Daddy was a number runner (Eine Tochter Harlems) by Louise Meriwether.
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Author Meets Translator with Mithu Sanyal and Alta L. Price
On 20 September 2023, we spoke with Mithu Sanyal and Alta L. Price as part of our event series “Author meets Translator”. You can read the conversation here.
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“But German in particular was tricky”: An Interview with Tara June Winch
The ambition was to write about the colonization of Australia and the terrible inheritance it created. The push was to show the depth and power of language and culture as it attaches to wellbeing.
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Writing and translating are not neutral: an interview with Kavita Bhanot
Kavita Bhanot is a writer, editor, translator, teacher, and activist based in Birmingham, UK. We were lucky enough to chat to her about her work and her perspective on translation – translation as a political act, a form of violence, and a tool to foster dialogue when used responsibly.
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On the Representation of Migration in the British Press: A Conversation with Anna Islentyeva
We spoke with linguist Anna Islentyeva about her research on migration discourse in the contemporary British press. She explains how Brexit has affected the discourse around European migration and how the linguistic patterns used by conservative and left-liberal media differ, but also resemble each other.
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