A 736-page anthology of the short stories of Cynthia Ozick—one of the great American Jewish writers of the past half-century—has recently appeared in Spanish. Rikki Novetsky comments:
This new translation of Ozick’s own stories [into Spanish] is apropos for a writer who was obsessed with the implications of translation and language choice. In “Preface to Bloodshed,” Ozick’s introductory essay to the collection Bloodshed & Three Novellas, she argues that English is an inherently Christian language, and cannot accommodate the themes she wishes to relate in her uniquely Jewish fiction. Of course she has no other choice but to write in her mother tongue: “What is English language (and its poetry) if not my passion, my blood, my life? . . . Still, though English is my everything, now and then I feel cramped by it.”. . .
In Ozick’s short story “Envy; Or Yiddish in America,” she writes about Hershel Edelshtein, an aging Yiddish poet seeking a translator so he can enter mainstream American culture. Perhaps Ozick would now smile at the letter Edelshtein receives upon being rejected by a translator he attempts to hire: “Though your poetry may well be the quality you claim for it, practically, reputation must precede translation.”
More about: American Jewish literature, Arts & Culture, Cynthia Ozick, Jewish literature, Translation
