Yes, you're so right John about how books are "mutable organisms"--what a great phrase to describe this. There are passages in your novel No Man's Brooklyn that have this amazing feeling of being translated, like "I want to disillusion my grandfather and tell him that I wasn't the best in my class, the best student, I was a pretty good student," on p. 114. There's a flow and cadence to that that has that feel of "bridging the gap," as you say. I have to read that Jay Rubin book.
This is something I have "felt," or wondered about myself, and at times, definitely have a sense as if I am translating myself, or doing my best to translate and/or transcribe language/images/ideas that are not "me," but that I am corresponding with. I also believe in the medium-ship and channeling aspects/angles, not only to writing, but to various creative forms and modes of alchemy, so where these voices come from, why they come from, who they belong to, never belonged to, imprints and echoes of the living, the dead, the unborn, the undefined, etc., all of this is something by which I am endlessly fascinated and curious, and the limitlessness of that spectrum is awe-inspiring and rich in rabbit-holes. As someone who reads a ton of writers in translation, I sometimes forget how pivotal the translator's role is in bridging the gap, so to speak. I just finished a book by Jay Rubin, about Haruki Murakami, and as someone who has translated Murkami's work from Japanese to English, he touches upon the difficulties of trying to express an idiom, flavor, tone, which honors Murakami's intent, or the spirit of his expression, in its morphed makeover. I also think about how, no matter what, books are always changing and morphing, that they are mutable organisms, since my relationship to them changes depending on that time in my life when I read them, where I'm at, who I am, and all that jazz, and those perspective shifts are wonderful. I get to be a different reader at different phases in my life. That's why, when I go back to reread The Absolution of R.A. Laing, the experience is going to be a different one. That's pretty cool.
Yes, you're so right John about how books are "mutable organisms"--what a great phrase to describe this. There are passages in your novel No Man's Brooklyn that have this amazing feeling of being translated, like "I want to disillusion my grandfather and tell him that I wasn't the best in my class, the best student, I was a pretty good student," on p. 114. There's a flow and cadence to that that has that feel of "bridging the gap," as you say. I have to read that Jay Rubin book.
Writing while "in character".
Reading while "in character"…
Dreaming while "in character"...
This is something I have "felt," or wondered about myself, and at times, definitely have a sense as if I am translating myself, or doing my best to translate and/or transcribe language/images/ideas that are not "me," but that I am corresponding with. I also believe in the medium-ship and channeling aspects/angles, not only to writing, but to various creative forms and modes of alchemy, so where these voices come from, why they come from, who they belong to, never belonged to, imprints and echoes of the living, the dead, the unborn, the undefined, etc., all of this is something by which I am endlessly fascinated and curious, and the limitlessness of that spectrum is awe-inspiring and rich in rabbit-holes. As someone who reads a ton of writers in translation, I sometimes forget how pivotal the translator's role is in bridging the gap, so to speak. I just finished a book by Jay Rubin, about Haruki Murakami, and as someone who has translated Murkami's work from Japanese to English, he touches upon the difficulties of trying to express an idiom, flavor, tone, which honors Murakami's intent, or the spirit of his expression, in its morphed makeover. I also think about how, no matter what, books are always changing and morphing, that they are mutable organisms, since my relationship to them changes depending on that time in my life when I read them, where I'm at, who I am, and all that jazz, and those perspective shifts are wonderful. I get to be a different reader at different phases in my life. That's why, when I go back to reread The Absolution of R.A. Laing, the experience is going to be a different one. That's pretty cool.