donal mclaughlin
on & off the pageBEF & MY MOTHER’S LOVER & MY FATHER’S BOOK
Donal is included in Best European Fiction 2012 (Dalkey Archive Press, USA) – both as an author and as a translator.
With both a new short story (‘enough to make your heart’), and his version of an extract from Sez Ner by Arno Camenisch, Donal joins writers from 33 countries around Europe. The volume – edited by Aleksandar Hemon, and the third in a highly regarded series – appeared in November 2011.
“the rhythm king of Scottish fiction Donal McLaughlin”
… “lends literary heft to this anthology”
New Statesman, 12.12.2011
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My Mother’s Lover, Donal’s translation of Der Geliebte der Mutter by Urs Widmer, was published in June 2011 (Seagull Books) and subsequently nominated for the Newton First Book Award of the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
“Donal McLaughlin’s translation delivers all the charm, sweet sorrow and gentle humour of the original.“
The Independent, 9.12.2011
Donal will accompany Urs Widmer on a reading tour of India early in 2012.
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My Father’s Book by Urs Widmer, again in Donal’s translation, appeared in November 2011. Advance copies were available at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October.
In this companion to My Mother’s Lover, the narrator is again the son who pieces together the fragments of his parents’ stories. Widmer brilliantly combines family history and historical events to tell the story of a man more at home in the world of the imagination than in the real world; a father who grows on the reader just as he grows on his son.
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all happening!
In the month in which Donal’s book appears, ‘big trouble’ – a new story commissioned by the Scottish Arts Council – has also been published on the SAC website.
Set in 1968, this story is a prequel to the Liam stories in an allergic reaction to national anthems & other stories (which has been reviewed favourably in the latest Scottish Review of Books, as well as in The Herald [Glasgow]).
To read ‘big trouble’, visit the SAC website and click on ‘Arts in Scotland’ and then ‘Literature’. Alternatively, copy and paste the following link: http://www.scottisharts.org.uk/1/artsinscotland/literature/features/shortstory.aspx
Donal has also recently received Issue 16 of the French poetry magazine N4728 – which includes translations of poems by the Gaelic poet Meg Bateman on which Donal collaborated with the French poet Laurent Grisel.
All of this, hot on the heels of the Sommer-akademie of the Literarisches Colloquium Berlin in late August, for which Donal was selected, together with a dozen other translators from all over the world. Chile, China, Denmark, Hungary, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Latvia, the Netherlands, Romania, Thailand, Turkey, and Uzbekistan were the other countries represented.
A superb five-day programme impressed Donal and his fellow translators greatly. Talks by leading literary critics, readings by some of the biggest names in German literature, visits to various publishing houses around Berlin – as well as generous book gifts – combined to provide the participants with a great overview of what is going on in German literature NOW.
Imagine a dozen or so translators from all over the world coming to Scotland each year & being offered a similar programme…
UPDATE: June 2009
A whack of material has been added here of late – especially to Windows on the World (Column 2).
The entry on Paulette Dubé now includes a wonderful letter to her son, André, written as he was about to travel to Ireland this Spring. Paulette’s experience of Northern Ireland in May 1986 will chill you.
You can also read extracts from both Gergely Nagy‘s novels. The one from Angst will take you to present-day Budapest, a city that has changed considerably since the revolutions of 1989-90 in eastern Europe. The extracts from Loud! are a must (not just) for lovers of The Clash & Fender guitars!
Slovene writer Andrej E. Skubic merits special attention too. Andrej is the editor of an anthology of Scottish writing in Slovene translation – and a great fan of Jim Kelman (whom he was translated) and Janice Galloway. The extracts from his novel Fuzine Blues allow us to see how his editorial and translation work may have impacted on his writing.
Finally, you might want to look at the section on The Reader (the play) under Translations: material relating to Donal’s collaboration with Chris Dolan, back in 2000, to create a stage version of Bernhard Schlink‘s best-selling novel Der Vorleser / The Reader. Now a film, of course. And out on DVD.
