How do we really make ourselves understood to other people? This question is at the heart of David Bellos' funny, wise and life-affirming language book, which shows how, from puns to poetry, news bulletins to the Bible, Asterix to Swedish films, translation is at the heart of everything we do - and [...]
A "New York Times" Notable Book for 2011 One of "The Economist"'s 2011 Books of the Year People speak different languages, and always have. The Ancient Greeks took no notice of anything unless it was said in Greek; the Romans made everyone speak Latin; and in India, people learned their neighbors' l[...]
An NBCC Award and Los Angeles Times Book Award finalistA "New York Times" Notable Book for 2011 One of "The Economist"'s 2011 Books of the Year People speak different languages, and always have. The Ancient Greeks took no notice of anything unless it was said in Greek; the Romans made everyone speak[...]
People speak different languages, and always have. We all use translation to cope with the diversity of languages. This title ranges across the whole of human experience, from foreign films to philosophy, to show why translation is at the heart of what we do and who we are.[...]
An old woman is awoken in the dead of night by knocks at her front door. She opens it to find her daughter, Doruntine, standing there alone in the darkness. She has been brought home from a distant land by a mysterious rider she claims is her brother Konstandin. But unbeknownst to her, Konstandin ha[...]
This is the first annual omnibus edition in the new Penguin Inspector Maigret series, comprising four titles from the series so far: Pietr the Latvian, The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien, The Carter of La Providence and The Grand Banks Cafe. Additional material includes the original French first editio[...]
By the early 1970s, Romain Gary had established himself as one of France's most popular and prolific novelists, journalists, and memoirists. Feeling that he had been typecast as 'Romain Gary', however, he wrote his next novel under the pseudonym Emile Ajar. His second novel written as Ajar, "Life Be[...]
Translated into English for the first time, this is Georges Perec's unique, puzzling, and often imitated memoir. At once an affectionate portrait of mid-century Paris and a daring pointillist autobiography, Georges Perec's / Remember is the last of this essential writer's major works to be translate[...]
Psychologically incisive and impeccably crafted, "Agamemnon's Daughter" tells the crushing story of passion shattered by a heartless regime. Once again, Kadare denounces with rare force the machinery of oppression, drawing us back to the ancient roots of Western civilization and tyranny. This collec[...]
Old-school publisher meets e-reader: chaos ensues There's a lot of good to be said about publishing, mainly about the food. The books, though - Robert Dubois feels as if he's read the books, but still they keep coming back to him, the same old books just by new authors. Maybe he's ready to settle i[...]