“Every Choice We Make Is Political”: Natasha Lehrer on Translating “Consent” and “I Hate Men”
Natasha Lehrer is a prize-winning literary translator from French to English. She recently translated
Consent, Vanessa Springora’s memoir of her teenage relationship with the writer Gabriel Matzneff, which sent shock waves through France and triggered a rape investigation; and Pauline Harmange’s bestseller
I Hate Men, a book-length essay that found unexpected success after an employee of the French ministry for gender equality attempted to have it banned. In this interview, conducted via email, Lehrer discusses the influence of these books on French society, her “winding” career path, and translation as “a profound and political act of decentering the self.”
Acts 4:23-31
23 As soon as they were released they went to the community and told them everything the chief priests and elders had said to them.
24 When they heard it they lifted up their voice to God with one heart. Master, they prayed, it is you who made sky and earth and sea, and everything in them;
25 it is you who said through the Holy Spirit and speaking through our ancestor David, your servant: Why this uproar among the nations, this impotent muttering of the peoples?
26 Kings on earth take up position, princes plot together against the Lord and his Anointed.
Sinkings
A tenuous link between the corporeal and spiritual forms the backdrop of Haukur Ingvarsson s poem about our relationship to the changing natural world, from his 2018 collection Ecostentialism.
has its own topography
in the inner ear
for some reason I feel
this must be Denmark
and glistens on white teeth
when she tilts
V
should I scrub the tank?
is the water too cruddy?
with unwelcome life?
should I set them free?
I have a secret
I saw the wreck
down to the wreck
into that deep down darkness
and unlock secrets
I’d mix myself a drink
I must be dreaming
Magma
Warning: This text includes descriptions of intimate partner abuse and may be disturbing to readers.
In this excerpt from Thora Hjörleifsdóttir’s debut novel, Magma
, a woman narrates the evolution of an abusive relationship.
Chlamydia
I didn’t know it would be such a big deal; it’s not like it’s incurable. Nobody’s going to die. We’ll take antibiotics and then, ten days later, it’ll be gone. But now he thinks I’m a total slut. And I must be, since I’ve infected people. But I think he’s being unfair. It shouldn’t matter this much. He acts like I’ve rejected him because I’ve been with other men. We weren’t together when I went to Central America; we’d gone on one date and I hadn’t even slept with him. I was traveling alone, so I slept around because I had nothing better to do and I needed to fill in the gaps. I didn’t know that something would grow between us; in fact, I thought it’d never happen, but I became more and more take
The Husband and His Brother
After his wife’s sudden departure, Böddi speaks to his brother over coffee in this story about regret, love, and family by Björn Halldórsson.
Jóhann was the first to stand up when the phone rang. He was glad for the interruption. His in-laws were over for dinner and they’d been talking politics. They were finishing their coffee, along with pieces of expensive dark chocolate that Ella, his wife, had arranged on a decorative plate. He’d just gotten the kids in bed and hurried into the hall to answer before the ringing aroused their curiosity. “Hello!”