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French to English: Pierre Michon, or writing that delivers General field: Art/Literary Detailed field: Journalism
Source text - French Considéré unanimement comme l’un des auteurs majeurs de la littérature française contemporaine, Pierre Michon raconte à travers une dizaine de livres au phrasé dense et lyrique son combat pour devenir écrivain, le processus de la création et l’infinie grâce de ses maîtres à penser qui ont pour noms Faulkner, Beckett, Rimbaud, Balzac, Hugo ou Flaubert.
Pendant longtemps, Pierre Michon s’est défini comme « l’écrivain qui n’écrit pas », tant il était ébloui par la splendeur de l’écriture, paralysé par la peur de ne jamais pouvoir égaler la perfection d’œuvres qu’il admire tellement. Notamment celle de l’homme « aux semelles de vent » (Rimbaud) qu’il avait découvert lors de sa scolarité dans une ville de la Creuse (centre de la France) dans les années 60. « C’est l’époque où je me suis mis à penser comme un poète maudit : je voulais écrire, j’avais la certitude que je ne pourrais rien faire d’autre, mais j’en étais incapable », rappelle-t-il à ceux qui l’interrogent sur son parcours d’écrivain atypique.
Quête du sens esthétique, et du sens tout court
Puis il y a eu le miracle des Vies minuscules qu’il a fait paraître à trente-neuf ans, en 1984. Tout Michon est là, dès ce premier livre, ce langage lumineux au phrasé serré et dense qui sert à restituer la vie, arrachée ainsi à son insignifiance. Récit quasi autobiographique, Vies minuscules raconte, dans les interstices de huit tableaux, portraits de petites gens de la campagne où il a grandi, l’accomplissement inespéré du destin d’écrivain de son auteur. C’est un chef-d’œuvre qui se situe dans la lignée des plus grands, en particulier de Beckett et de Faulkner qui ont aidé Michon à se délivrer de ses aliénations et à se frayer son chemin à travers une écriture exigeante, obsédée par les correspondances mystérieuses entre la vie et l’art.
Cette quête du sens esthétique, et du sens tout court, traverse la dizaine d’ouvrages qu’a publiés Pierre Michon depuis 1984. Des textes en partie fictionnels, en partie historiques, consacrés aux peintres (Goya, Watteau, Van Gogh) et aux écrivains (Balzac, Faulkner, Rimbaud) qu’il vénère, et dont les parcours individuels servent à explorer les thèmes qui lui sont chers : la vanité et la nécessité de la représentation, les mystères de la création. L’œuvre de cet auteur atypique compte aussi des fragments de romans (La Grande Beune et Le Roi du bois) qui sont de courts récits de l’univers rural et campagnard.
En 2002, il reçoit le prestigieux prix Décembre pour Abbés et Corps du roi, deux textes brefs comme le sont tous les ouvrages de Pierre Michon, saisissants d’âpreté et de concision. Dédié aux auteurs fétiches de l’auteur, Corps du roi revient sur le processus de l’écriture, à travers le prisme du mythe du corps double du roi, l’un sacré et éternel et l’autre physique et voué à la décomposition. De même, le sens de la véritable œuvre littéraire survit aux contingences historiques et temporelles dans lesquelles elle prend pourtant sa source, semble suggérer Michon, lecteur des grands maîtres de la littérature qui sont les véritables protagonistes de cette fable.
L’Empereur d’Occident, publié en 1989, et qui vient de paraître en édition de poche, nous entraîne au Ve siècle apr. J.-C. sur les pas d’un empereur romain fantoche. À travers l’histoire tragique de ce personnage qui n’a pas su être empereur et assumer son destin, Michon transforme sa propre hantise de l’échec et de l’inachèvement, dont l’écriture l’a délivré, en une métaphore obsédante de notre condition humaine.
Translation - English Unanimously considered one of the major authors of contemporary French literature, Pierre Michon recounts in some ten books with dense and lyrical phrasing his struggle to become a writer, the process of creation and the infinite grace of his masters in thought who go by the names of Faulkner, Beckett, Rimbaud, Balzac, Hugo and Flaubert.
For a long time, Pierre Michon defined himself as “the writer who doesn’t write,” so dazzled was he by the magnificence of writing, paralysed by the fear that he would never be able to equal the perfection of works he so much admired. Notably the work of the man “with soles of wind” (Rimbaud in the words of Verlaine) whom he discovered at school in a town in Creuse (centre of France) in the sixties. “That was the time when I took to thinking like a cursed poet: I wanted to write, I was certain that I could do nothing else, but I was incapable of it,” he recalls to those who ask him about his career as an atypical writer.
A quest for aesthetic meaning, and for meaning itself
Then a miracle occurred with Vies minuscules [Lives Under Glass] which he brought out in 1984 at the age of thirty nine. All of Michon is there, from this very first book, this taut and densely phrased luminous language that serves to restore life, dragged out of its insignificance. An almost autobiographical narrative, Vies minuscules relates, in the interstices of eight pictures, portraits of small people from the countryside where he grew up, the unhoped-for fulfilment of the author’s destiny as a writer. It is a masterpiece that falls within the tradition of the greatest, in particular Beckett and Faulkner who helped Michon free himself from his sense of alienation and to work his way through a demanding form of writing, obsessed by the mysterious correspondences between life and art.
All the books published by Pierre Michon since 1984 are shot through with this quest for aesthetic meaning, and for meaning itself. Partly fictional, partly historical texts about the painters (Goya, Watteau, Van Gogh) and the writers (Balzac, Faulkner, Rimbaud) he reveres, and whose individual journeys serve to explore the themes that are dear to him: the vanity and the necessity of representation, the mysteries of creation. The work of this unusual author also includes fragments of novels (La Grande Beune [The Origin of the World] and Le Roi du bois [The King of the Wood]) which are short narratives about the rural world of country people.
In 2002 he was awarded the prestigious Prix Décembre for Abbés [Abbeys] and Corps du roi [The King’s Body], two short texts, like all Pierre Michon’s books, striking for their harshness and concision. Dedicated to the author’s favourite writers, Corps du roi mulls over the process of writing, through the prism of the myth of the dual body of the king, the one sacred and eternal and the other physical and destined for decomposition. Similarly Michon, a reader of the great masters of literature who are the true protagonists of this fable, seems to suggest that the meaning of the true literary work survives the contingencies of history and time from which it nevertheless takes its source.
L’Empereur d’Occident [The Western Emperor], published in 1989, and which has just come out in paperback, takes us to the 5th century AD, in the steps of a puppet Roman emperor. Through the tragic story of this character who has not managed to be emperor and accept his destiny, Michon transforms his own obsessive fear of failure and incompletion, from which writing has delivered him, into a haunting metaphor for the human condition.
Spanish to English: architectural design Detailed field: Architecture
Source text - Spanish Sobre un plano urbano, el proyecto estudia el carácter que debe tener una actuación en la ciudad hilvanada con la ordenación próxima, con el paisaje urbano, el parque y con las amplias vías que lo envuelven.
Los volúmenes se despliegan en planta y en altura hasta convertirse en una torre doble en el vértice del solar en la que se concentran las vistas sobre el parque. El plano de apoyo continuo se quiebra mediante rampas y se rehunde para ser basamento común y acceso a los portales. Los espacios públicos abiertos se encadenan con los edificios de forma que la linealidad del bloque abierto no excluye la formación de espacios de pequeña escala y de fácil mantenimiento en los cuales quedan inmersas las unidades edificatorias, propiciando visiones longitudinales, transversales y diagonales.
Las viviendas, con la zona de día pasante en el fondo de doce metros del bloque, permite ventilación cruzada y variantes con la combinación de estas piezas. Unas y otras se traban alternativamente a un lado y otro del bloque para componer las fachadas en las que aparece el hormigón estructural plementado con grandes piezas prefabricadas de hormigón estriado oscuro.
Translation - English The project considered the nature of building in an urban setting in a way that would integrate with adjacent structures, the urban landscape, the park and the highways that surround it.
The volumes open out from the ground floor and above to form a double tower at the apex of the site, with views focused on the park. The continuous base line is broken by ramps and drops down to form a communal area with access to the entrance halls. The public open spaces connect with the buildings in such a way that the linearity of the open block does not exclude the formation of small-scale and easily maintained spaces surrounding the built units, creating longitudinal, transverse and diagonal sightlines.
The housing units, with rooms used in the daytime running twelve metres through to the back of the block, allow ventilation and variations in the room combination. They are connected alternately to either side of the block to form façades in which the structural concrete is exposed along with large prefabricated pieces of dark grooved concrete.
Portuguese to English: excerpt from a novel Detailed field: Poetry & Literature
Source text - Portuguese Termina outra vez uma tarde de verão. A Marta já é uma mulher, tem dezasseis anos. A Maria imita-lhe todos os gestos de forma desengonçada, tem catorze anos. Na cozinha, a nossa mãe faz qualquer trabalho simples, supérfluo, e termina outra vez uma tarde de verão. A claridade que entra pela janela do quarto, que toca as dobras das cortinas, é amarela e doce, como uma gota de mel a escorrer de encontro à luz. Depois da janela, o sol desce sobre prédios e, por momentos, torna os seus ângulos incandescentes. A claridade toca o rosto da minha irmã Marta, sentada sobre a sua cama feita, e toca o rosto da minha irmã Maria, sentada no chão, sobre os pés, de joelhos dobrados à frente, encostada à parede. A Marta tem um namorado e ninguém sabe, ninguém pode saber, só a Maria. Às vezes, durante o jantar, a Maria e a Marta olham-se porque há alguma coisa que as lembra dos seus segredos. A Maria sonha com o dia em que também terá um namorado, sonha com ele. Durante instantes, como um relâmpago, acredita ver o seu rosto: todos os pormenores, os olhos, os lábios, as linhas tão reais. A Marta e a Maria misturam as suas vozes com sonhos. A Marta conta aquilo que sente e conta mil vezes todos pequenos encontros que tem com o namorado, tudo o que acredita, tudo o que entende. A Maria conta as histórias que lê nos romances de amor, conta as suas conclusões, diz: e se não tivesse acontecido isto, e se não tivesse acontecido aquilo, e se ele não fosse ciumento, e se ela não fosse orgulhosa. A Maria ouve a irmã, como se finalmente encontrasse uma heroína dos romances de amor. A Marta ouve a irmã, imaginando-se com os mesmos dilemas de uma heroína dos romances de amor. As suas vozes são femininas e luminosas. A tarde termina devagar. O Simão chega do trabalho, passa por mim e pela minha mãe. O tempo é calmo sobre os objectos e no movimento do mundo. O meu pai chegará depois. Até lá, o entardecer, como uma chuva de papéis rasgados atirada do céu.
Translation - English Another summer evening comes to an end. Marta is a woman now, she’s sixteen. Maria imitates her every gesture clumsily, she’s fourteen. In the kitchen, our mother is doing some ordinary, unnecessary task, and another summer evening comes to an end. The brightness that comes through the bedroom window, touching the folds in the curtains, is soft and yellow, like a drop of honey flowing into the light. Outside the window, the sun is going down over buildings and, for a few moments, it makes their edges glow. The brightness touches the face of my sister Marta, sitting on her made bed, and it touches the face of my sister Maria, sitting on the floor, on her feet, her knees bent in front of her, leaning against the wall. Marta has a boyfriend and no one knows, no one can know, only Maria. Sometimes, at mealtimes, Maria and Marta look at each other because something reminds them of their secrets. Maria dreams of the day when she too will have a boyfriend, she dreams about him. For a moment, like a flash she thinks she sees his face: every detail, his eyes, his lips, his lines that seem so real. Marta and Maria merge their voices with dreams. Marta says what she is feeling and recounts a thousand times every little meeting with her boyfriend, everything she believes, everything she understands. Maria recounts the stories that she reads in romantic novels, she tells her their endings, she says: and if this hadn’t happened, and if that hadn’t happened, and if he hadn’t been jealous, and if she hadn’t been proud. Maria listens to her sister, as though at last she’s found a heroine from a romantic novel. Marta listens to her sister, imagining herself with the same dilemmas as a heroine from a romantic novel. Their voices are feminine and bright. The evening draws slowly to a close. Simao comes home from work, he walks past me and past my mother. Time is calm on the objects and on the movement of the world. My father will come home later. Until then, the evening falls from the sky like a rain of torn paper.
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Translation education
Bachelor's degree - University of Sheffield
Experience
Years of translation experience: 37. Registered at ProZ.com: Jun 2005.
Spanish to English (University of Sheffield, verified) Portuguese to English (University of Sheffield) French to English (Society of Authors: Translators Assoc.) Portuguese to English (Society of Authors: Translators Assoc.) Spanish to English (Society of Authors: Translators Assoc.)
NEWS: from 2016 onwards I will be working almost exclusively on book projects.
Brief bio:
I graduated with an Honours degree in Spanish and Portuguese in 1975, having been awarded a prestigious translation prize in my final year. I then lived in Paris, working as a translator from French and Spanish into English, and I travelled widely in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking countries in Latin America. In 1983 I founded TransAction Cooperative Ltd in Sheffield, now TransAction Translators Ltd, where I gained experience in translating for local industry and business and in the management of multilingual projects. I left the company and moved to a different region in 1995 and have worked full time as a freelance translator ever since. I specialise in architecture, archaeology, art, art history, childrens' books and other fiction, culinary (recipe books), culture, design, history, international development, journalism, literature, perfumery & cosmetics, politics, sociology, tourism and wine & oenology.
I have translated over 45 books on art, art history, architecture, interior design, wine, food, perfumery and fiction.
I have also worked as a translator and editor on a number of dictionaries for Larousse and Chambers, including translation of the cultural inserts and historical timelines of the Harrap's Unabridged French-English dictionary (2 volumes).
Some examples of what people have said about my work:
"Thank you for your beautifully written work, really wonderful!" (Musées sans Frontières, Portuguese translations)
"am writing to pass on our client's compliments for the Arenas article you did for us recently. Both they and the author thought you did a fine job so congratulations and thank you for what I know was a very tricky piece."
(the writer concerned was the late Cuban-born writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante)
"une traduction fine et intelligente" (Fondation Napoléon)
"By the way, I thought you did a very nice job with our website. I reread the whole thing and it reads very smoothly and naturally, particularly the portraits." (Parisian translation company's own website)
"Le client veut absolument que ce soit toi qui fais la traduction !! Il était très content avec ta traduction du livre écrit par sa femme que tu as fait l’année dernière"
"Just to let you know that we find your translation perfect!" (Translation agency in Milan)
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