Event Listing - Literary Arts
Tue Nov 10

Re-translating Gunter Grass

LIT&LUNCH: Re-translating a Masterpiece: Breon Mitchell on Günter Grass


Tel. 415-512-8812
Email LIT&LUNCH: Re-translating a Masterpiece: Breon Mitchell on Günter Grass
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Location
Date and Time
111 Minna Gallery
111 Minna Street
San Francisco, CA 94105 map
cross street: between New Montgomery & 2nd
district: Downtown/Financial District

Tue Nov 10 (12:30 pm - 1:30 pm)

Description
2009 sees the publication of one of the most important re-translations in decades: Breon Mitchell’s re-translation of The Tin Drum by Günter Grass, only the second time this novel has been translated into English in its 50-year history. Bring a lunch and join the Center for this LIT&LUNCH event! Mitchell will read from his excellent new translation, discuss why it was important to give readers a second translation of The Tin Drum, and talk about the unique collaboration with Grass that made such a daunting work possible.

For the re-translation, Mitchell spent a week with Grass in Danzig, discussing word choice and visiting actual locations used in the book. The result is a fresh new translation that, as Mitchell says, offers a valuable new companion to the original translation. “A translation is a reading,” Mitchell writes. “Each new version offers, not a better reading, but a different one."