CAT Book Club: So Much Schwob

At the beginning of this month we asked, Who Is Marcel Schwob? I think we all have a better understanding after listening to two of Marcel Schwob’s translators, Chris Clarke and Kit Schluter, discuss the influential French writer this week in San Francisco.

The night began with several spirited readings from Marcel Schwob’s Imaginary Lives and The Children’s Crusade, followed by a conversation moderated by Stephen Sparks.

Listen to audio from the night’s event below along with a list of some of our takeaways from the discussion:

• Marcel Schwob loved to cull from other texts, making him a particularly challenging writer to translate. Chris and Kit talk about how they went in search for Schwob’s many hidden references.
• Kit discusses Fleur Jaeggy’s essay “The Passive Adventurer”(opens in a new tab) about the final days of Marcel Schwob’s life.
• All of Schwob’s fiction was written very early in his life. After he got sick, he began to translate a lot more.
• Schwob was a recluse who only decided to venture out into the world right before his death. He became ill and died shortly after returning home.
• “To me Schwob was always the link between Plutarch and Borges,” says Chris Clarke.
• Stephen Sparks calls Schwob “the secret hinge” of literature in terms of influence.
• “What is it about Schwob that has kept him so secret but also so secretly influential?” Stephen asks the translators.
• Kit discusses Schwob’s influence in Latin America versus his influence in France.
• Chris talks about who has influenced Schwob, including Daniel Defoe and Robert Louis Stevenson.
• A conversation about what it means to translate and the importance of multiple translations of a single work.