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Guest Columnists: Lucha Corpi and Nuria Brufau Alvira. Translation and Voice: A poet’s and writer’s views.

Michael Sedano

La Bloga is honored and excited to present this two-part series by Lucha Corpi and Nuria Brufau Alvira, Translation and Voice: A poet’s and writer’s views. The pair examines the process of Nuria's translating Lucha's Eulogy for a Brown Angel into the 2011 Spanish novel, Loa a un ángel de piel morena. 

In Eulogy, Corpi writes one of the best opening scenes in chicana chicano literature, a woman fleeing the police riot at Laguna Park, stumbles upon grisly infanticide. Corpi grabs the reader's attention and hurls the reader into a moral morass. The publisher notes:

Loa a un ángel de piel morena es una novela trepidante, de gran suspense, y llena de personajes diversos e interesantes. En el apogeo del movimiento chicano a favor de los derechos civiles en 1970, el cuerpo profanado de un niño pequeño yace inerte en una calle del Este de Los Ángeles, durante una de las manifestaciones socio-políticas más violentas en la historia de California. La activista política Gloria Damasco descubre el cuerpo del pequeño y, en ese instante, se enfrenta también el hecho de que su modo de percibir la realidad es un «don obscuro» que va más allá de la lógica «normal». En el transcurso de las siguientes cuarenta y ocho horas, dos personas más mueren asesinadas. Gloria no se permite sino el seguirle la pista a los asesinos hasta verlos entre rejas, así le lleve toda la vida. Cada paso en su investigación la conduce de Los Ángeles a la Bahía de San Francisco. Así mismo, la introduce en el camino de una conspiración internacional, una sangrienta venganza, y la violenta y trágica conclusión del caso en la pintoresca región vinícola de Napa, California.

In today's guest column, Lucha Corpi relates the writer’s experience in seeing her creation transformed in the hands of another, in understanding the uniquely creative writing process of translating chicanidad along with the words.

Next Tuesday, April 10, Nuria Brufau Alvira relates the translator’s experience negotiating the confluences of language, speech, cultural content, plot, and character, to fashion for Spanish language readers the same novel United States readers recognize as a classic of la literatura chicana.

La Bloga readers can order both novels via their local independent bookseller.

Every once in a while I get asked a question along the lines of "why write crime fiction?" in a way that implies that I could be spending my time in much more worthwhile pursuits. And many reviewers still insist on bestowing backhanded compliments on crime writers who blow them away by criticizing the genre they write in. For example, take this sentence from the Denver Post's recent review of Sleepless, by Charles Huston (Ballantine Books): "He is a standout young voice in what might be considered the genre of crime fiction, but his writing is simply too good to be genre-constrained." Jeez, enough already.

Seeing as how there isn't much I can do about the condescension or outright prejudice against crime, mystery and detective fiction, I will, instead, continue promoting crime writers and books whenever I get the opportunity; readers you take it from there.

In the spirit of internationalism, I present a list of recent crime fiction (or novelas negras, if you prefer) originally written in Spanish (or Portuguese) and now translated into English. There's got to be one, at least, on this list that will grab your attention; introduce you to a new writer; or turn out to be the best read you've had in months. This is Part I; Part II continues next week. The text is taken from publisher or author summaries.