Hanne, the main character of The Translator by Nina Schuyler, teaches Japanese and lives in LA.  She had been working on the translation of a novel by a famous Japanese author-it will be his first work to be translated into English and so there is a lot of pressure to get it right.  She likes the process of translation and now that her children are grown she is able to immerse herself in her work, uninterrupted and able to sink deeply into the meaning of the words and what they convey.  When she emerges to take a break, she talks with her son and his family but she is estranged from her daughter; a nagging dissonance in her otherwise organized and satisfactory life.

And then she has an accident-a terrible fall down some marble steps and hits her head. When she regains consciousness in the hospital she can no longer speak English, or her native German-only Japanese.  Although this phenomenon is unusual it is obviously a consequence of her fall and the doctors assure her that she will most likely reacquire her ability to speak English and German in time and with enough rest.

In order to feel less isolated, Hanne decides to accept a speaking engagement for a translation symposium being held in Japan.  There at least she will be able to communicate directly with people and maybe she will be able to talk with the author of the book she has translated.  In the middle of her speech at the symposium, a man gets up and leaves creating a large disturbance in the audience. After her speech she is confronted by the same man who she now realizes is the author of the book she translated, who accuses her of being incompetent and arrogant for changing his book and the main character, who is based on a living Noh actor, into something completely different from his vision. Shaken by this confrontation Hanne decides to accept the author’s challenge and goes to visit the Noh actor on whom the character is based. What she finds during this visit is not merely a new understanding of the book and the character, but a new way of translating what has happened in her own life and of understanding the conflict and pain between herself and her daughter.

Since I am a Japanese translator (although not of novels!) I admit that I was a bit skeptical that a novelist would be able to understand the subtleties that were involved in the translation process, but Schuyler does an excellent job of conveying the meticulous and sometimes agonizing process of trying to choose words that not only convey a literal meaning but also the tone, flavor and atmosphere that the original contains. But Schuyler goes beyond that and uses the very intimate translation process as a metaphor for understanding ourselves and our interactions with others.  Her descriptions of Hanne as she peels away the layers of her own understanding of what happened with her daughter, and begins to step into what her daughter might have seen or experienced was very nuanced and felt true. Schuyler paces her story well and the characters, especially Hanne, are well developed and interesting.

This was great book to start the New Year!

Brenda’s Rating: **** (4 Stars out of 5) 

Recommend this book to: Keith, Sharon, Lauren and Marian.

Book Study Worthy? Yes

Read in ebook format.