南向き翻訳事務所 岩渕デボラ ブログ

 友達の青木美由紀さんは最近本を出しました。美由紀さんは日本で一番優しい、そして一番たくましい女性だと私は思っています。彼女はNPO法人シェアで色々な国で仕事をしてきました。中には、南アフリカでエイズ患者のために働きました。（下の写真はジャイカのサイトと美由紀さんの活動日記より。）

その経験をもとに、本にしました。

この本は南アフリカの状況、親をなくした子供達のこと、エイズで病んでいる子供達のこと等、写真と情報がたくさんつまっています。

元サッカー日本代表北澤豪選手の南アフリカでの経験談も本の最初に載っています。本の売り上げの一部はNPO法人シェアによせられるそうですので、是非ご協力をよろしくお願いします。誰でも美由紀さんのような働きはできませんが、本を1冊買って、その働きに協力することはできます！

Nobuko Takagi has won the 36th Kawabata Yasunari Literature Award for Short Stories. The winning story was “Tomosui,” a tale set in the Philippines, written as a part of her Soaked In Asia project, and first published in Shincho magazine, April 2009.

Read the English version (by Deborah Iwabuchi) on Ms. Takagi’s blog.

第３６回川端康成文学賞（川端康成記念会主催）は１５日、高樹のぶ子さん（６４）の「トモスイ」（新潮２００９年４月号）に決まった。賞金１００万円。授 賞式は６月２５日、東京・虎ノ門のホテルオークラで。

トモスイはここで読みます。

南向き（岩渕デボラ）の英訳も高樹先生のブログで読むことができます。

2009年暮れから2010年の2月末までノンフィクションの映画を４つ見ました。どれも最初から最後まで釘付けになりました。フィクションは最後に近づくと始末を２〜３ぐらい考えられるので眠くなりますがノンフィクションはわかりませんね。本当の話だから。英語の諺ではTruth is stranger than fictionがありますが、その通りです。

最初の２つの映画は東京で見ました。群馬に上映はする気配はなかったので。

『インフォーマント』マット・ディモン 主演（説明が難しく。きっとそのために群馬にこないでしょう。http://wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/theinformant/　予告編をどうぞ！）

『ジュリー＆ジュリア』メリル・ストリープ主演　（フランス料理で有名なジュリアチャイルドと彼女に憧れたライターのジュリーさんの話。英語ではこの作品が女性が好きな映画、つまりchick flick、というかもしれないが、私は傑作だと思います！）　http://www.julie-julia.jp/

『インビクタス：まけざる者たち』唯一前橋で上映した映画です。またマットーディモン主演ですが、それは仕方がないです。監督はクリント・イーストウッド、そして話の主人公は元南アフリカ大統領ネルソン・マンデラです。そこからきらいにはなれないです。マンデラが大統領になる以前、南アフリカが舞台になる映画は全部悲劇でみていられませんでした。さすがにこの映画は違います。インビクタス、笑いがあって、涙があって、感動はあります！クレジット中、本物のマンデラとラグビーチームの写真がでるので、嬉しいかぎりです。　http://wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/invictus/

『幸せの隠れ場所』このために3年ぶりに伊勢崎の映画館に行きました。 サンドラ・ブロック主演です。大きいホームレスの黒人青年が金持ちの白人家族に入れられて、成功をするという話です。フィクションなら社会的問題は数え切れないほどあるけれど、本当の話だから感動は感動にかさなります。最後のクレジット中に本人たちの写真がたくさんでるのでさらに満足です。http://wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/theblindside/main/

I’m on my eleventh book since I bought my Kindle in October 2009. That makes, let me see, eleven more books than I would have read otherwise. To show the advantage, I’ll sort them out by “motivation.”Back in pre-Kindle days, I never would have considered buying so many even if they were so inexpensive–just trying to figure out where I would put them! This way I get immediate gratification and the only fuss is my credit card statement.

Books I bought immediately after I read the review in the newspaper:

Anne Frank: The Book, the Life, the Afterlife by Francine Prose

Fly By Wire by WIlliam Langewiesche

Books I bought because my sister recommended them:

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

Noah’s Compass by Anne Tyler

The Writer as Migrant by Ha jin

A book I bought right after seeing the movie on which it was partially based:

My Life in France by Julia Child and Alex Prud’Homme

Books I’ve been wanting to read anyway, and there they were:

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Teacher Man by Frank McCourt

Garlic and Sapphires: the Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise by Ruth Reichl

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King

A book I bought because it was only about $3:

The Non-Fiction Works of  Mark Twain

本をアナログで読むかディジタルリーダーで読むか、討論は続きますが、一番得しているのは読者です。こちらでは、星野富弘の『愛、深き淵より』の英語版(Love from the Depths: the Life of Tomihiro Hoshino)の元出版社の立風書房が学研に取得されて、学研はとりあえず続版を考えていません。このような本はディジタル状態でいつでも手に入れることができれば、win-win situationだと言えるではないでしょうか。また、忘れてはいけないことの１つは、ディジタルリーダーを使いたくない方は印刷した本を読めば良いと思います。私としては、アマゾンのキンドルを買ってから、アナログの本を前よりも買うようになりました。一旦買い出すととても止めにくい習慣です。

A number of years ago I read Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer. It was a fascinating read, describing all the details of climbing Mt. Everest. It was so descriptive, in fact, that I felt out of breath the entire time I was reading it. I still think about it almost compulsively–the life-threatening, not to mention, incredibly uncomfortable experience that is commonly referred to as “conquering Everest.” Krakauer provided me with a sufficient Everest experience. I’m happy both to have read it and also to never go there myself.

Eat Sleep Sit had much the same effect on me.  The Japanese title is “Eat Sleep Sit: The Story of Training at Eiheiji.” Presumably, the Japanese reader knows the implications of Eiheiji as a temple where Buddhist monks are trained. I appreciate how the Kodansha International editor made it clear in the title that (1) it wouldn’t be an idyllic year of sitting on wooden verandahs gazing out at moss gardens, and (2) it only lasted a year. The latter comes as a relief early on, although by that time the inclusion of “Sleep” in the title begins to raise questions.

Author Kaoru Nonomura decides to quit his job, leave his girlfriend, and set off for a year of training at Eiheiji. When he arrives, he stands at the door to the temple, in the snow, and ends up having to shout himself hoarse before he is allowed in–and the experience (from this reader’s eyes) goes downhill from there as the trainee leaves every last ounce of freewill outside the temple. Every single act of a trainee, each individual motion of that act, is set down by Dogen, the thirteenth-century founder of Eiheiji. As an example, the section “Lavatory” is nine pages long. And this is where the “Into Thin Air” effect begins to take hold. The rules are so complete and invasive that, on the one hand one wants to scream “waaaay too much information,” but on the other it is fascinating and one wants to read every word of it. The monks learn how to live as Zen automatons, although the author concedes that that may be what Zen is all about–emptying the mind by not having to make a single decision, no matter how minor.

I give veteran translator  Juliet Winters Carpenter a great deal of credit for making a large amount of ancient instruction accessible in English to the modern non-Japanese reader. In fact, I looked through the Japanese version at one point and was overwhelmed with the  passages written by Dogen so many centuries ago and even the modern re-rendering of them as the author puts them into practice. I understand that Buddhist scholars were consulted in the translation work, and the results are clearly evidenced by how easy it is to read.

As with Into Thin Air and Mt. Everest, however, Eat Sleep Fit completely cured me of any desire to actually experience spending even a night at Eiheiji. The life of the new monks is a living hell. They get perhaps two or three hours of sleep a night, come close to malnutrition, and are bullied and abused by their senior monks (most who have arrived only a few months ahead of them) in ways that would be considered criminal in any other setting. Looking at the book from this point of view, the clarity of the prose leaves nothing to the imagination, and the reader begins to feel groggy from pain and exhaustion. Here I give Nonomura credit for being able to remember in such detail the sort of trauma that usually wipes clean the memories of its victims.

The final word? I couldn’t put it down! Eat Sleep Sit, for a disconcerting but fascinating read!

I wrote earlier this fall about assisting in the translation of Mayumi’s Kitchen, a book on macrobiotic cooking written by Mayumi Nishimura, formerly Madonna’s personal chef.

The book arrived in the mail today, and it looks fantastic!  The recipes are beautifully presented and more “approachable” than one (me) might imagine when it came to macrobiotics. In fact that is Ms. Nishimura’s whole idea: to make macrobiotics appealing and available.

Since I wasn’t an “official” translator and joined the project close to deadline, I was delighted to find my name in the acknowledgments– just 6 lines from Madonna!

How many layers of separation does that cut out? We translators live with a very dubious proximity to fame, but it’s fun and gives us something to talk about when we come out of our caves.

Mayumi’s Kitchen is available from amazon.co.jp as of next week, and will be on sale in the US in June.

Japan Times reviewed Sleeping Dragon by Miyuki Miyabe.

The review itself was pretty good, but the title of the review left something to be desired.

“Ink-stained wretch meets psychic teen freak.”

Oh well, maybe that’s what readers are looking for.

We took a trip to Tokyo and visited the main Kinokuniya in Shinjuku to check out the “state of our books.” Publishing may be in a sorry state, but “our” books were on prominent display. Here’s what we found. Click on the photos (taken by our official iPhone photographer) to get a good look!

In first place, barely off the street was Kazuko Enda’s new book, Google Eibun Writing. According to Kodansha International editor Mio Urata, the book is selling “like hotcakes.” I admit, it’s not officially “our” book, but I helped, I’m happy about it–so there! Naruhodo Eigo Writing was up on the 7th floor, on the shelf.

In second place we have the Miyabe books. Second place because two books were positioned prominently next to each other–Devil’s Whisper and Sleeping Dragon. The other Miyabe books, including Crossfire, were  lined up in the shelf above.

Our first Japanese book: BPD Survival Guide was out for all to see. Seiwa Shoten made a good overall showing!

Finally, Poison Ape from Vertical.  The first book in the series was out, while the second was hidden on the shelf. (No sign of Translucent Tree, a personal favorite!)