I was reading Saramago's Ensaio sobre a Cegueira (Blindness) and at certain points I just couldn't stop thinking how fully in awe (and jealous) I am of this man's mastery of the Portuguese language. Every moment of his writing is filled with such brutality yet also so much characteristically Portuguese dry humour; his occasional sprinkling of old proverbs to add to the irony of a situation, his unashamed use of regional vocabulary at points, it is just incredible. I know there are good translations of his around, but I just can't ever imagine removing Saramago from his beloved Portuguese language.

Writers like him, Clarice Lispector, Mia Couto, Cesário Verde, Machado de Assis, Eça de Queirós, Fernando Pessoa, Jorge Amado... all from wildly different contexts in the lusophone world, yet all leave me equally in utter awe and pride of our beautiful romance language.

What about you? Have you ever thought about how thankful you were to be reading a book in the language it was originally produced in? If so, which made you think that?

Comments

boxer_dogs_dance t1_jdxgnvl wrote on March 27, 2023 at 10:14 PM

Terry Pratchett.

SorryManNo t1_jdx5e70 wrote on March 27, 2023 at 8:58 PM

My brain is an English only club lol I’ve learned a bit of Spanish and Japanese but not enough to read a book and comprehend it to a degree of enjoyment.

Maybe one day.

wjbc t1_jdwcsqd wrote on March 27, 2023 at 5:56 PM

Yes, pretty much all of them. Translations are by their nature suspect.

But I have heard that the English translations of Frederick Hegel are actually easier to understand than the original.

Prax150 t1_jdwt3b7 wrote on March 27, 2023 at 7:39 PM

I wish I could read the Three-Body Problem trilogy in Chinese. Ken Liu gets a lot of praise for his translation of the first book but I'm currently halfway through the second and I'm wondering if the translator made different choices cause it feels different.

birdnest07 t1_jdwznxs wrote on March 27, 2023 at 8:21 PM

Frankenstein in Baghdad! Some of the dialogue bits being in iraqi Arabic was actually one of my favourite things about this novel.

mitkah16 t1_jdzpetu wrote on March 28, 2023 at 11:29 AM

Carlos Ruiz Zafon!

I started reading the Shadow of the Wind in English until I realized that I was being stupid as my mothertounge is Spanish hahaha. The feeling and the expressions in Spanish are just marvelous!!.

South_Honey2705 t1_je30pl5 wrote on March 29, 2023 at 1:10 AM

OMG I would love to read in the romance languages how lovely.

strangest_tribe20 t1_je6erv4 wrote on March 29, 2023 at 7:09 PM

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell.

Let me explain, I'm Brazilian, native Portuguese speaker. And this is one my favourite books.

To OP, if you can read in Portuguese, try Valter Hugo Mãe. I've recently finished a book called O filho de mil homens.

Idk if there's a translation in English.

rerito t1_je9vxd5 wrote on March 30, 2023 at 1:59 PM

French here, I'ld say all Camus' works and of course a favorite of this sub: The Count of Monte Cristo! Zola deserves some love too as he was truly a master with words.

I've taken up to reading in English as well and liked many books that way. However it can't beat my mother tongue.

KingSzmaragd t1_jedbatt wrote on March 31, 2023 at 4:32 AM

As a portuguese native speaker, I think Saramago is the only author (at least among those I know) whose books must suffer a very important loss when translated from portuguese to any other language, to the point it really affects the experience. The other authors you mentioned may suffer a little, but no one even close to Saramago IMO. I am not convinced of the exact reason for that, but maybe it happens because Saramago writes like our head thinks (like a deep and continuous thought) and that is more particular to a language than a text designed to be "correctly structured" and to make sense, as most authors do even in their native languages.