I used to be a translator and now I am a milk bar. Both are quite solitary jobs and I can’t say that I’ve ever been much of a people person, that’s why the work of a translator suits me. I don’t mind standing in someone’s shadow. There’s a kind of masturbatory pleasure in producing a book that others can read and find enjoyment from on their own without the pressure to produce the original. However much I have wanted to produce something separate from someone else. And if a mother’s work is mostly work that is unseen, then translating is perhaps more mother-like than I have given it credit for
...more
