Some Latin American translators and writers

Liz Henry — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:57:33 -0500

I just got back from the American Literary Translators Association conference, which I liveblogged. I thought I'd highlight some of the fantastic Latin American & Spanish-speaking authors and translators here on Blogher "World" for your enjoyment, whether they have blogs or not. (We wish they *all* had blogs, right?)

Ana María Shua, an Argentinian fiction writer; I heard Rhonda Dahl Buchanan read from Ana Maria's "Quick Fixes". They were short-short stories, almost prose poems, funny as hell.

Elizabeth Lowe read from her translations of Brazilian novelist Regina Rheda. Lowe described Rheda's work as being concerned with ecofeminism, anti-globalization, immigration and diaspora, and wild wordplay.

Graciela Lucero-Hammer read from her translation of Marisa Esterlich's Desnudos del Alma. She has also translated a novel by Argentine writer Reyna Carranza, Of Love and Madness.

Lila Zemborain read some of her poems, along with her English translator Rosa Alcalá, from her book Malvas orqíadas del mar. Lila commented that she had finished the book a few days before Sept. 11, 2001, and then her feelings about New York, and what she wanted to write about, changed so drastically that she didn't want to look at Mauve sea-orchids until very recently, years later.

Rosa Alcalá has translated poems by Lourdes Vásquez, Lila Zemborain, and Cecilia Vicuña. I wish I'd gotten more of a chance to talk with her!

Alicia Zavala Galvan read from her translations of Alfonsina Storni and Carilda Oliver Labra.

Trudy Balch, from New York, read an excerpt from her translations of a work by Gaby Brimmer, a writer from Mexico. The excerpt was written from multiple points of view; Gaby's, her mother's, and her caregiver's.

I didn't hear her read her work or speak on a panel, but I was delighted to meet Andrea Bell, a translator and science fiction scholar, the co-editor of Cosmos Latinos, an anthology of Latin American science fiction short stories.

I also met Wendy Call, a Spanish translator who is working closely with poets who write originally in indigenous American languages - Zapotec and other Native American languages from southern Mexico.

I was on a panel with writer and teacher Tanyika Carey, (French, Spanish, and English) whose translations include works by Gloria Alcorta, Nora Glickman, and Katy Camille Meister.

Others:

- Roseanne Mendoza, a Latin American literature scholar, publisher, editor, and translator
- Karen Philips, who is translating the memoirs of Victoria Ocampo
- Adriana Tatum (this link is actually a blog!), who translates from Hebrew and Spanish, and who is especially interested in Jewish Latin American writers
- Carolyne Wright, who translates from Spanish and Bengali (Bangla?)
- Cindy Schuster, co-translator of Cubana: Contemporary Fiction by Cuban Women, and a very active translator of poems and fiction

- Nancy Festinger, translator from Spanish, French, and Provencal.

- Jill Gibian, translator and teacher, focusing on literature, culture, and film from Latin America

Andrea Labinger, who translates fiction from Mexico, Chile, and Argentina, including Alicia Steimberg's Musicians and Watchmakers and Call Me Magdalena as well as works by Ana María Shua, Luisa Valenzuela, and Sabina Berman.

Suzanne Jill Levine, translator of many Cuban and Argentinian writers; author of The Subversive Scribe: Translating Latin American Fiction.

And others I may have met briefly:
- Ellen Doré Watson, translator of Brazilian poet Adélia Prado
- Claire Sullivan, translator of Alicia Kozameh
- Lilvia Soto, poet and translator living in Mexico
- Katherine Silver, translator of Elena Poniatowska and many others
- Rose Shapiro, who translates contemporary Latin American poetry
- Mónica Sánchez Escuer, a Mexican writer currently at University of Texas El Paso's bilingual MFA program; a writer and translator
- Anita Sag´stegui, who translates from French and Spanish
- Olivia Ruiz, an anthropologist and poet
- Joan Lindgren, an amazing translator...
- Claudia Routon, who translates contemporary Spanish lit from Spain, but we won't leave her out
- Josephine Nelson, also from UT-El Paso's Bilingual MFA program
- Stacy McKenna, translator from Spanish and French
- Alita Kelley, translator of many Peruvian writers, and founding member in 1966 of Haravec, a bilingual literary magazine in Peru.
- Priscilla Hunter, a translator and cinema studies scholar
- Elizabeth Gamble Miller, translator of many Latin American authors including Nela Rio, and member of the Academia Salvadoreña de la Lengua.
- Rachel Galvin, who was not at the conference, unfortunately
- Marisa Estelrich also couldn't make it to the conference
- Ivana Rangel Carlsen, translator from Brazilian Portuguese
- Mary J. Berg, who translates from Spanish and Portuguese
- Michele Aynesworth, translator of many Argentinian fiction writers

It was a pleasure to meet so many interesting writers and to hear about fiction and poetry that's new to me!

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Some Latin American translators and writers