China has always had problems with wolves. As in all farming societies, livestock in China endured centuries of predation by wolves and other fearsomely fanged creatures. The wolf was a bogey beast, instilling terror and revulsion quite out of proportion to its deeds.
On another continent, in Europe, the wolf was the symbol of darkness and evil, of nature red in tooth and claw, of a world beyond the human that was waiting to tear the throat out of any unwary human. Those attitudes went across the sea with the invaders and occupiers of “America”, and particularly of the northern continent so named. That the wolf was sacred to the nations that had lived there for centuries before the Mayflower threw its world-shattering anchor into the bay mattered not a jot to the farmers, hunters, trappers, prospectors and sundry others who bled ever westward.
When Chinese novelist Mo Yan accepted the Nobel Prize in Literature earlier this week, the relationship between literature and politics attracted much attention. The award is often given to writers who forcefully oppose political repression. When authors are from countries recently embroiled in political strife, or there are repressive dictatorships or socialist regimes involved, sometimes the artistic aspects of an author’s work receive less attention than they would for more famous authors. Even authors from stable, economically advanced countries are sometimes honored by the Prize as much for representing a new, repressed, or marginalized voice as for their literary achievements, leading many observers to conclude that the Nobel Literature Prize is “political.” It is very rare for the prize to be given to a citizen of a Communist country in good standing with his government; I believe Mo Yan is only the second, after the Soviet novelist Mikhail Sholokhov in 1965.
Feb 20, 2021
In recent years, Japanese literature has earned a reputation abroad for its edgy, socially-conscious fiction, which translator Stephen Snyder, 63, has had a hand in encouraging. Snyder has translated titles like “Coin Locker Babies” by Ryu Murakami, “Out” by Natsuo Kirino and last year’s finalist for the International Booker Prize, “The Memory Police” by Yoko Ogawa, which take on issues such as abandoned children, marginalized female factory workers and the role of literature in oppressed societies.
Snyder says how he chooses what to translate is “completely random.”
“After the success of my first translation, I chose novels I thought were the most interesting, whether they were literary or entertainment,” he says. “I’ve been incredibly lucky in picking the right ones because I’ve managed to translate some amazing novels, but there’s no rhyme or reason to my choices.”
Stephen Snyder: Distilling the essence of a literary work japantimes.co.jp - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from japantimes.co.jp Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.