Babel

by R.F. Kuang

He buried his past life, not because it was so terrible but because abandoning it was the only way to survive.

You’ll be one of the few scholars in the world that knows the secrets of silver-working. That’s what I’ve brought you here to do.’

In Latin, it takes only one. Discet. Much more elegant, you see?’ Robin wasn’t sure he did.

Auferre trucidare rapere falsis nominibus imperium atque ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant.

Charles Dickens, who was very funny but seemed to hate very much anyone who was not white.

For a country that profited so well from trading in spices, its citizens were violently averse to actually using them; in all his time in Hampstead, he never tasted a dish that could be properly described as ‘seasoned’, let alone ‘spicy’.

LOL

By the time they’d finished their tea, they were almost in love with each other – not quite yet, because true love took time and memories, but as close to love as first impressions could take them.

‘Or that you’re hoarding knowledge that should be freely shared,’ said Robin. ‘Because if language is free, if knowledge is free, then why are all the Grammaticas under lock and key in the tower? Why don’t we ever host foreign scholars, or send scholars to help open translation centres elsewhere in the world?’

is guns. Guns, and the willingness to use them on innocent people.’

And Robin found himself in the impossible position of loving that which he betrayed, twice.

‘Betrayal. Translation means doing violence upon the original, means warping and distorting it for foreign, unintended eyes. So then where does that leave us? How can we conclude, except by acknowledging that an act of translation is then necessarily always an act of betrayal?’

English did not just borrow words from other languages; it was stuffed to the brim with foreign influences, a Frankenstein vernacular. And Robin found it incredible, how this country, whose citizens prided themselves so much on being better than the rest of the world, could not make it through an afternoon tea without borrowed goods.

‘It’s us. Frozen in time, captured in a moment we’ll never get back as long as we live. It’s wonderful.’

‘She looks like starlight,’ said Robin.

Anger was a chokehold. Anger did not empower you. It sat on your chest; it squeezed your ribs until you felt trapped, suffocated, out of options. Anger simmered, then exploded. Anger was constriction, and the consequent rage a desperate attempt to breathe. And rage, of course, came from madness.*

You’re obsessed with punishment.