Translating Latife Tekin into Norwegian

And then I must confess that the big project this winter has been translating Dear Shameless Death, written by Latife Tekin, from English to Norwegian. Latife Tekin is Turkish, and I was acquainted with the author when visiting Saliha Paker in Turkey last autumn. I had three magic weeks there, the first in Istanbul, the second in Cunda and the third in Bodrum and then back to Istanbul. The two first weeks Anna from Cambridge was there too, the third week Saliha and I made up the team. In Bodrum we visited Latife Tekin who runs Gümüslük Akademis, a haven for poetry, philosophy and fine arts. Those of you who are interested in learning more about this place can visit: www.gumugslukakademisi.org/ 

Translating novels is not an activity I have indulged in as an adult. I have however written quite a lot of prose. but in Bokmaal, (the most common version of Norwegian). However, it didn´t work at all till iI suddenly realized that Latife demanded to be translated into Nynorsk, the more poetic and traditional version of Norwegian. Then she just poured over into the Norwegian language. It was a strange and magic time, seeing Latife´s universe unravel. 

Now it is time finding a publishing house and I must admit it´s not magic at all!