{"id":112553,"date":"2017-07-24T11:06:48","date_gmt":"2017-07-24T15:06:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=112553"},"modified":"2017-07-24T16:36:25","modified_gmt":"2017-07-24T20:36:25","slug":"the-uncanny-double-an-interview-with-megan-mcdowell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/07\/24\/the-uncanny-double-an-interview-with-megan-mcdowell\/","title":{"rendered":"The Uncanny Double: An Interview with Megan McDowell"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a>

Megan McDowell.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Horror, historical fiction, literary fiction, autofiction\u2014whatever the genre, the Spanish translator Megan <\/em>McDowell is drawn to work that takes her by surprise. <\/em>This is, in part, what compelled her to translate Samanta Schweblin\u2019s <\/em>Fever Dream<\/a>, a finalist for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize. The compact, urgent novel is told through an intimate dialogue between Amanda, a young mother on her deathbed, perhaps\u00a0poisoned, and David, a mysterious boy who sits beside her, urging her to remember what brought her to the brink of death. Through their exchange, we learn of\u00a0Amanda\u2019s\u00a0brush with\u00a0lethal pesticides, of a possible transmigration of souls, and, most importantly, of the disappearance of Nina, her\u00a0daughter<\/em>. Though it takes place in Argentina, where agro-industrial production technologies pose a variety of health risks, the novel is a cautionary tale for us all about the dangers that come with the use of\u00a0agricultural\u00a0chemicals.<\/em><\/p>\n

McDowell has translated more than\u00a0thirteen works of fiction from Spanish, including books by Alejandro Zambra, Lina Meruane, and Carlos Fonseca<\/em>. By the end of this year alone, she\u00a0will have translated\u00a0Mariana Enriquez\u2019s <\/em>Things We Lost in the Fire, <\/em>Diego Zu<\/em>\u00f1iga\u2019s <\/em>Camanchaca, <\/em>fiction by Alejandro Jodorowsky, and\u00a0<\/em>Loving Pablo, Hating Escobar,<\/em>\u00a0an autobiography by Virginia Vallejo. McDowell is<\/em>\u00a0currently at work\u00a0with <\/em>Schweblin on a new book of short stories titled\u00a0<\/em>Pajaros en la boca, or<\/em> Birds in the Mouth. McDowell does all this while working a job in finance. <\/em><\/p>\n

Our conversation began in New York City in 2016 and continued over Skype and email<\/em>. <\/em>McDowell is a seamless combination of upbeat and no-nonsense: she tells it like it is, but always with a sense of humor.<\/em> Throughout our conversation, she spoke about <\/em>the ways gender and translation are in dialogue with one another and of life as a translator in Portugal, Switzerland, Norway, the United States, and now Chile.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

How did you decide to translate Fever Dream<\/em>?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

When Riverhead offered me the book, I read it in one sitting and knew right away that it was unlike anything else. It\u2019s a psychological horror novel, one that gives the reader a lot of credit\u2014it leaves a lot for you to fill in, but it never loses your attention. Instead, the book creates a sense of dread and suspense you can\u2019t turn away from. It reminds me a lot of Heart of Darkness <\/em>in the way that it creates a world that feels isolated and suffocating, and then lets its characters play out their nightmares on that stage. But the real horror of it comes from this unseen, unknown danger, and the idea that we can\u2019t protect the people we love from the world\u2019s evil.<\/p>\n

I was also drawn to the book\u2019s female universe. Schweblin looks at the dark side of motherhood and femininity, and I appreciate that\u2014there\u2019s a lot of violence in the female experience that is often glossed over or ignored. Nearly all the main characters in Fever Dream <\/em>are women, except for one, and I\u2019m interested in what happens to a story when men aren\u2019t a part of it\u2014you almost never see that. These women aren\u2019t defined in relation to anyone except each other, which is intriguing yet also disconcerting. You don\u2019t entirely know how to think of them, since you can\u2019t think of them according to their place in society or their family network. We don\u2019t know much about where Amanda comes from, and that contributes to the feeling that we don\u2019t know where the book is taking us\u2014it only tells us what we need to know right now.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

The Spanish title is Distancia de rescate<\/em>, which translates to Rescue Distance.<\/em> Why the change to Fever Dream<\/em>?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

It was our publisher\u2019s decision. Publishers in other languages have done the same thing. In French, for example, it\u2019s called Toxique<\/em>. Rescue distance<\/em> is a phrase in Spanish but not in English, so our editors thought it wouldn\u2019t resonate as much with readers. I would have been okay with Rescue Distance<\/em> because I think it\u2019s self-explanatory\u2014you can guess what it might\u00a0mean even if you\u2019ve never heard the phrase before. Rescue distance<\/em> is the key concept of the book, and it\u2019s defined early on as the \u201cvariable distance\u201d separating Amanda from her daughter. But I do like Fever Dream<\/em> as a title, and it has seemed to click with readers. The only thing is that it makes people question the \u201creality\u201d of what\u2019s happening in the book, or whether it\u2019s all a hallucination. When I read the book, I took it all as \u201creal\u201d within the book\u2019s universe.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

What were some of the challenges in translating a book that\u2019s so dialogue driven?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

People always ask me about the problems I encounter with certain translations. Sometimes that\u2019s an easy question, but with this book, there aren\u2019t many things I can point to\u2014there was no wordplay, no idioms, no cultural references.\u00a0The most interesting thing with Fever Dream<\/em> is that it\u2019s told in dialogue, so it has to read like a conversation. You can\u2019t use language that\u2019s going to catch somebody up or have the reader ask, Oh, what\u2019s that? Or, That\u2019s interesting phrasing. You have to make sure that it flows in a way that replicates the way somebody might speak. That\u2019s probably the most important thing I had to keep in mind, and it meant that the translation process consisted of a lot of smoothing and polishing.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Two of your more recent projects\u2014Fever Dream<\/em>\u00a0and Mariana Enriquez\u2019s Things We Lost in the Fire<\/em>\u2014are by women, but most of the books you\u2019ve translated up till now have been by men. Was it a conscious decision to seek out work by female authors?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

I\u2019m certainly pleased to be working with more women writers. A few years ago, I realized I was only working on books by male authors, which meant I was a tiny piece of a big problem. I decided to look for women writers but found I didn\u2019t really have to\u2014I was offered two books I adored, both by Argentine women, Schweblin and Enriquez. I worried that attaching myself to both projects could hurt the books, that two very different and exceptional authors would be unfairly lumped together\u2014they\u2019re women from the same generation, both Argentines, and on top of that they have the same translator. My hesitation might have been a bit sexist\u2014neither I nor anyone else has ever questioned my translating multiple Chilean male writers from the same generation. But since the books were coming out within a couple months of each other, regardless of the translator, there\u2019s a risk. All I can say is, there\u2019s room for two great, contemporary Argentine women writers\u2014more even\u2014and I encourage people to read them!<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Is it the translator\u2019s job to send a reader abroad and preserve the foreignness of the book, or to adhere more closely to the sensibilities and particularities of the language it\u2019s being translated into?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

When I read a translation, the experience is often similar to reading an Oulipan text\u2014it follows unknown rules, held up by a hidden central axis. This is part of what originally drew me to translation in the first place. There are countless ways a text asserts its foreignness\u2014the way the characters interact, references to unknown places and names, unfamiliar cultural references or unusual syntax. I don\u2019t take it as part of my job to introduce or preserve those particularities, but I don\u2019t try to hide them either. And I dislike the phrase lost in translation.<\/em>\u00a0The idea that something always goes missing or gets left behind does so much damage to the profession and perception of translation. Translation is a creative practice, it\u2019s subjective. It can be done to varying degrees of success, sure, but I reject the idea that a translation is inherently inferior to its original. After all, any book is a translation of its writer\u2019s thoughts\u2014things are added or forgotten in the process of transfer from brain to page. But you have to take the final piece as it is rather than as a reflection of some kind of hallowed platonic ideal.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

It seems like translation is an ongoing, living process for you. Is that true?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

Much like writers who are writers all the time, translation\u2019s not something I can turn off. I have so many different voices in my head at any given time, and it\u2019s important for those voices to talk to me\u2014a lot of translation is answering questions like, What would X do? What would she say, and how? It\u2019s more than just translating words on a page, it\u2019s understanding the spirit behind them.<\/p>\n

I live this life, in another country and another language, so that I can do this thing I want to do as well as I can. I spend so much of my time on it that sometimes it feels like a sacrifice. There\u2019s a part in the book Pond<\/em> by Claire-Louise Bennett that applies so much to me. She writes,<\/p>\n

If you are not from a particular place the history of that particular place will dwell inside you differently to how it dwells within those people who are from that particular place \u2026 You have no stories to relate and compare, you have no narrative to inherit and run with, and all the names are strange ones that mean nothing to you at all \u2026 All the names mean nothing to you, and your name means nothing to them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s how I feel living in Chile, a place where I\u2019ve ended up and know a lot about but maybe don\u2019t have the right to inhabit fully.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

And yet, you do seem to inhabit it fully.<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

I make myself at home in places I shouldn\u2019t be.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Have you always roamed around?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

The first time I took a Spanish class was in middle school, in Richmond, Kentucky. I barely paid attention because I thought I\u2019d never use it. I\u2019d probably never met a person from outside the U.S., and the larger world felt very far away. But neither of my parents are from Kentucky, and I grew up with the idea that you don\u2019t stay where your family is when you\u2019re an adult. When it came time to go to college, I looked farther afield, and then I just kept looking farther.<\/p>\n

I have a twin sister, and she\u2019s a big part of why I can roam\u2014I know there\u2019s someone in the world who understands and loves me unconditionally, which is a kind of freedom. When I moved to Chile for the first time, in 2004, we decided to get hopscotch tattoos because we\u2019re both big Cort\u00e1zar fans. I was inspired to become a translator by Gregory Rabassa\u2019s translation of Rayuela<\/em>. I have a whole theory that twinhood made me more prone to become a translator because a translated text is like an uncanny double of the original. As a twin, you define yourself\u2014and others define you\u2014in relation to each other, not as a discrete entity. The result is that you struggle to find your individualism but also, perhaps, that you\u2019re comfortable with duality. It\u2019s applicable to translation, which we always see as a reflection of the original, but of course a translation has to stand on its own and function as a single, unified entity in the world.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Do you feel responsible for the global success of your writers?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

I try to keep a distance from the books I translate. They aren\u2019t mine. Only Alejandro Zambra could have written his books, but I\u2019m not the only one who could translate them. I feel a reader\u2019s deep love for the books I translate, but not ownership. In the end, my job is to take care of the book as it\u2019s born in another language, to understand it, champion it, and make decisions to its benefit. Much of a translator\u2019s work overlaps with the editor\u2019s.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Translators tend to play an invisible role in publishing, and many of them are women. What do you make of this?<\/p>\n

MCDOWELL<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure why that gender disparity is there, assuming it is. People always ask me if I write, and I usually say no. But I have often felt that I might have been a writer were I a man. There are so many factors, and one never really knows, but the fact that the literary tradition is masculine had an effect on me during my tender years as a reader. I didn\u2019t consciously think, I can\u2019t do this because I\u2019m a woman, but I did feel a kind of alienation from this thing\u2014literature\u2014that I loved and that occupied so much of my time. I felt like an outsider looking in rather than a participant. Which is what a translator is, an outsider looking in.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Raad Rahman is a New York\u2013based Bangladeshi writer, freedom-of-speech advocate, and child-rights specialist. She has worked with global humanitarian organizations like UNICEF<\/small> and the International Center for Transitional Justice, across Europe, North America, the Caribbean, and South Asia.<\/em><\/p>\n

Raluca Albu is a Romanian American writer and translator. She\u2019s a senior nonfiction editor for\u00a0<\/em>Guernica\u00a0and the online literature editor for\u00a0<\/em>BOMB.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Horror, historical fiction, literary fiction, autofiction\u2014whatever the genre, the Spanish translator Megan McDowell is drawn to work that takes her by surprise. This is, in part, what compelled her to translate Samanta Schweblin\u2019s Fever Dream, a finalist for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize. The compact, urgent novel is told through an intimate dialogue […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1195,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[907],"tags":[9797,362,22906,29591,29593,6847,29589,675,12552,9036,29592,13609,29597,29594,29588,11051,29590,29596,29595,21097,530,75],"class_list":["post-112553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-at-work","tag-alejandro-zambra","tag-argentina","tag-art-of-translation","tag-autofiction","tag-carlos-fonesca","tag-chile","tag-fever-dream","tag-gender","tag-historical-fiction","tag-horror","tag-lina-meruane","tag-literary-fiction","tag-lnaguage","tag-mariana-enriquez","tag-megan-mcdowell","tag-oulipo","tag-samanta-scweblin","tag-spanish-translation","tag-things-we-lost-in-the-fire","tag-translating","tag-translation","tag-writing"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe Uncanny 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