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Journal Entry 2 by KathleenMolloy on Tuesday, June 17, 2008
 I wonder what Sheila Fischman reads for fun?
I've started to read Volkswagen Blues by Jacques Poulin. Set in the Gaspésie region I'm heading east with Poulin, up and around the hilly roads, out toward to blue water. My memories of my road trip to Gaspé are blue – the colour blue. Memory plays tricks on us but when I think of this beautiful region in Quebec I think of the colour blue and so many of our family photos feature the coastline villages with the water backdrop. With the except of a few pictures of us standing under wind turbines on wind farms on the north shore, most of the pictures are of my little family posing at the water's edge. Blue.
I didn't get far in the book before I flipped it closed to consult the cover. I'm reading the translation by Sheila Fischman. I'm not sure why I picked up the English instead of the French original. Poulin's style is fluid and an Anglophone with a fair grasp at French can follow along swimmingly. I don't know if it is fair to describe his style as 'old fashion story telling' but that is my impression - not too many confilicts, not to much word play, lots of imagery, lots of physical description, slow introduction to the characters who might turn out to be secondary to the facts in the story.
The story has a tranquile cadence. Now I have to ask myself: is this because Poulin is a great storyteller or is it because Sheila Fischman is a great storyteller?
You'll remember Sheila Fischman as the translator that introduced much of Anglo Canada to the works of Roch Carrier, Michel Tremblay, and Anne Hébert. She has shared the voice of over 125 works by Canadian Francophones, in particular Quebecers... with the rest of Canada. In May 2008 Fischman was presented with the Molson Prize recognizing her outstanding lifetime contributions to Canadian cultural. The $50,000 Molson prize will buy her A LOT of books.
I wonder what type of books Sheila Fischman takes to the cottage, curls up by the fire with, and piles beside her bed To Be Read later? On the other hand, maybe Sheila Fischman doesn't read for pleasure at all. Maybe it feels too much like work.
Maybe she writes. When translators get paid to interprete and convey the words of others, are they ever tempted to put pen to paper to craft their own prose?
I'm going to ask my translator Gisèle Lamontagne and my copy editor Josée Prud'homme. While they adapted Dining with Death into La Mort au menu I never once in the entire process asked either of them what it was about their craft that drew them in, enabled them to polish the rough bits so that the diamond sparkled through of any given piece by any author.
How does someone develop the skill to make another artist look good, in a completely different language?
If you see Sheila Fischman at the next awards gala, ask her for me.
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Journal Entry 3 by KathleenMolloy on Sunday, August 10, 2008
After 36 years of travelling I am now somehow able to read in the car without barfing. I discovered this new talent as we wound our way up Route 138. What this meant is that during the 19 hour trip I devoured 3 books by Canadian authors over 3 days.
Given that it was a road trip, I finished off the delicious Volkswagen Blues by Jacques Poulin in no time. The story begins with a fatigued writer picking up a hitchhiker in Gaspé. The writer has lost his brother, not buried him, but simply lost him. The hitchhiker tags along enroute to California where they suspect the brother has disappeared to. As they discover traces of the brother’s trail all clues suggest that the lost Canadian may have had a shady past. Or worse, he might have been a poet. As the man seeks his brother, the woman reflects on who she is as an Indian in North America and together they follow the Oregon Trail as though they were the earliest European settlers. The story telling is simple, the story is simple and the one feeling that I had after finishing it was the simple pleasure of reading about strangers being kind to each other.
The second book that I enjoyed was work of non-fiction called An Acre in Time. This work reflects on how a single acre of land has developed over time (geologically, naturally, socially, polictically…) been exploited, changed hands, changed hands again, then been exploited again and so the story goes. The acre in question is a parcel east of Canada’s Parliament buildings, on the Ottawa side of the river. Phil Jenkins’s retelling of the acre’s story is both thoughtful and thorough. It is a lyrical romp back in time and causes one to reflect on how we bandy about the word “mine” as in “my land”. It is the seventh work by a west Quebec author that I have enjoyed under the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge.
http://www.philjenkins.ca/
A third book, this one by Torontonian David Bezmozgis was a collection of stories aptly titled Natasha and Other Stories. It is a fly-on-the-wall look at little Mark growing up in Toronto in the 80s after his Jewish family arrived in Toronto from the U.S.S.R to try to make a go of it. What struck me about this collection is how very real the 80s felt page after page. When I was in grade six, in Toronto, in the 80s, a new girl joined our class from Poland. Katerina L was tall, pale, and elegant. She quickly became the class’s math whiz and we became instant nerdy friends. She lived in 1 bedroom apartment (her dad slept on the chesterfield – her mom and brother were still in the Soviet Union) and she smelt like pickles. I loved pickles and I adored her dissected family because her dad invited me to join them on Friday nights to go swimming. After our swim we shared a warm bowl of cabbage soup in their apartment. They had nothing yet they shared it and I loved them for that. In my 11 year-old way I tried to help them fit in. But one day when I arrived at their apartment and rang their buzzer I was taken aback when I discovered that they had changed the buzzer name plate from their perfectly-nice Polish name to “Molloy”. To this day, I’m not sure why I reacted in the way that followed and I am sure I will always regret having done this but at the sight of my family name on their buzzer I felt the “fitting in” had gone a bit too far. I felt betrayed. Perhaps I should have taken it as a compliment. Perhaps I should have discussed it with the dad; owned up to my feelings. But I didn’t. I shut down. I stopped accepting swim dates and pickles. I stopped walking to school with Katerina.
But I wasn’t a complete little shit when I was 11. Even as a sixth-grader I collected good people. Natasha and Other Stories reminded me of another girlfriend in my class named Sally Thomas. Sally was the best speller in our school, a fantastic storyteller, and one of the best hitters at slow pitch. She was very competitive and from grade 1 on she became a perfect ally for me. She was the first to do everything (including get a bra) and instead of lauding it overall the other girls she let us come along for the ride as she reached all the summits and firsts. I am not at all surprised to learn that Sally is currently in Beijing where she is competing as an Olympian weightlifter. That’s one helluva summit.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/44355-ottawas-thomas-looking-for-great-lift-at-beijing-paralympic-games
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Journal Entry 4 by KathleenMolloy at Cobourg, Ontario Canada on Sunday, August 10, 2008
Released 3 yrs ago (8/10/2008 UTC) at Cobourg, Ontario Canada CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:
CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:
Released from Port Cartier Quebec by Canada Post to a dear friend in Cobourg to read at the spa
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Volkswagen Blues
This book is in a Controlled Release!
