Review of The Subversive Scribe by Suzanne Jill Levine

Posted on May 10, 2010 by

title=subversive-scribe-suzanne-jill-levineFor a while now, one of my favorite working translators has been Suzanne Jill Levine. That's partly because she's a great translator and thinker, and partly because she has translated some of the greats of Latin American literature, and thus some of my favorite authors (the list is huge, but some are Borges, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, and, of course, Manuel Puig)
Three Percent has a nice review of her book on translation, The Subversive Scribe, which was recently reissued by the Dalkey Archive Press. I've read the book, and it's kind of a cross between translator's memoir, translation case-study tutorial (Levine discusses many textual problems she's dealt with as a translator), and a discussion of translation theory (Levine comes across as a very incisive thinker).
Three Percent's review offers another reason why I found this book so compelling:

Although Levine has experience with a myriad of distinguished and prolific Latin American writers, she focuses The Subversive Scribe's narrative upon three writers who were all Latin Americans in exile (each in his own way was a subversive, and not only as a literary artist): Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Severo Sarduy, and Manuel Puig. Ultimately, she argues that above all, the translator, just as the author, must be a writer in order to succeed.

In other words, this book comes across as a huge proponent for the translator's visibility in the process. It's a nice, really interesting read for anyone interested in translation, and I highly recommend it.