In silhouettes, clouds, mist, and partially veiled names, this novel by Najwa Barakat speaks of the underbelly of Beirut through a cloud-shrouded figure dwelled by demons of his own writings. As our Book Club selection for May, Mister N is a story of what writing can and cannot do to us, how it resonates through individuals and communities, moving through borders both physical and psychological.
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Carol Khoury (CK): Since 2014, you have translated six Arabic novels into English, three of which are by Muhsin al-Ramli, and two by Najwa Barakat (the sixth by Shahad al-Rawi). Barakat is Lebanese, while al-Ramli and al-Rawi are Iraqi. One obvious theme between these writers is their coming of age during various wartimes, and furthermore, all of the novels are to an extent shadowed by, if not immersed in, themes relating to war. How do you choose the novels you want to translate?
Luke Leafgren (LL): The first few novels that I translated were all very random—things that came my way. I started translating when I was about thirty, about twelve years ago; I was finishing my dissertation, and I needed something more enjoyable to do—some kind of creative outlet. When I expressed an interest in translation, one of my Arabic teachers at Harvard, Khaled al-Masri said, said: “I’ve got a friend, Muhsin al-Ramli, looking for a translator for his second book. If you like it, I can introduce you.” I read it, and, you know, I could hear how it might sound in English, and I felt like I related in some ways to the protagonist. That was how I translated my first novel. After that, Khaled introduced me to Najwa.
It’s only been after receiving The Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize that I’ve been able to think more about projects that I would choose and which directions to go. Thinking about novels that I would choose, I feel a certain loyalty to authors I’ve translated already; I feel gratitude to them, and I believe in them, so I could imagine translating more novels by writers I have worked with in the past.
CK: Was Najwa Barakat involved directly in the process of translating this book?
LL: We have an email connection, so she was ‘involved’ in the sense that I could send her questions. As I translate, I make a very quick rough draft, highlighting in the Arabic text passages or words that I want to come back and focus on. Then I make lists of queries, and those lists I often prioritise, because I can’t ask everything; I’ll send them my top questions, and then that might resolve some other questions, then if necessary, I’ll come back with maybe another set. Najwa was very encouraging and supportive, but I think she had a certain amount of trust in my translation as well.
CK: Your BA degree is in English and theology, and in Mister N., Barakat employs several religious symbols, mainly from Christianity, but also Islam. What is your take on the numerous biblical connections in the text—Lazarus, in particular? It seems to me that the real function of this tale within Mister N. is not the awakening after death (resurrection), but rather Lazarus’ disapproval of it.
LL: For my whole life I’ve been taken by the power of stories, and I think one aspect I especially appreciated was the way literature and religion interact—how religious ideas can shape literature or how texts can be used to communicate questions or beliefs. And that attracts me to this novel as well. I was very interested in the figure of Lazarus and how that figure is being used, and I think you’re right—it’s not so much about the resurrection. It’s asking a question I hadn’t come across in other contexts: of whether or not Lazarus really wanted it, of his impression after being called back to this world, his reactions and accounts. Mister N somehow sees this tale as a symbol, a representation of himself. The dirt in Lazarus’ mouth is being compared to the way words are getting tangled in Mister N.’s mouth, as a symbol for madness or writer’s block. The utility of that religious imagery is an excellent example of how a writer can tap into biblical narrative power and drama, while also kind of subverting it and challenging it. It’s a very effective technique.
CK: But it seems that not all the symbolism Barakat uses is so easy to read or to decipher—for example, the recurring motif of 10:25. What’s your take on it?
LL: Good question! At first, I was annoyed when that kept coming up in the novel, but then I started getting a sense of what was going on. You could read it on multiple levels—such as, anytime I look at the clock and I see 12:34, I notice it, and it almost feels symbolic. I’m struck by this thought, how is it that it’s always 1234 when I’m looking at the clock? Of course it isn’t, but that specific time sticks in my mind.
In the novel, 10:25 is the moment after his father goes through the window. In a sense, I think its repetition in the book is showing us that in some ways, it was the defining moment of Mister N.’s life, and every moment after it is somehow referencing that moment of intense loss and abandonment and terror. It also connects to the psychological state of Mister N; there’s some level of instability in the character—you never know entirely at what level he is operating, if it’s a reality or some kind of psychosis.
One other thing that comes to mind with that number is how time functions in the novel, that we are always circling back, jumping in one direction or another. 10:25, it comes around the clock twice every day, and time keeps circling for Mister N. as well.
CK: You mentioned words when you talked about the dirt in Lazarus’ mouth and how Mister N. related to that. In this specific novel, Barakat touches on the notion of writing. This character is a writer who has gone back to writing after a fifteen-year halt, and the text is loaded with direct and indirect questions about the need to write, but more importantly about the ever-lasting question—why we write:
Is that what my life can be boiled down to, a long train of words? Each word is a compartment full of characters and events, followed by a coupling that joins it to another compartment filled with other characters and other events. I wander from one to the next but do not come across myself. Where am I in all of this? Or from all of this?
Do you perceive the act of translation as a form of writing? Where are you in all of this? Or from all of this?
LL: For me, translation is writing. You have to embrace that part of it especially if you are doing literary fiction, which is creating a work of art out of another work of art. I mentioned earlier that when I was growing up, literature was incredibly powerful for me, and kind of shaped my imagination. I thought of books as endless, powerful ways of influencing the world. There was a part of me that wanted to be a writer, but I didn’t know how to get into it, or maybe didn’t have the courage. So translation was the way I discovered to participate in that literary creation, without the pressure of creating a narrative or inventing characters and dialogue. I get to experience that, and I get to think about the English language and how to use it. I’m also constantly learning more about Arabic, so it is a process that’s very enjoyable and meaningful to me.
As far as the question of having something to say to the world—sometimes when I think about literature or translation, it gives me the same immediate pleasure as playing video games when I was younger, or doing a sudoku. On every page, it’s puzzle after puzzle. It’s satisfying and gratifying to help an author reach an audience, to help bridge cultural gaps by making literature available. I wouldn’t want anybody to pick up Mister N. and say: this is what the Arab world is, or, this is what Arabic literature is. But it’s important to see these images of Beirut. It’s important to hear about and in some ways experience the suffering of Syrian refugees passing through Beirut. That feels like a mission that I want to support and a way I’ve found to contribute to the world.
CK: Yes, we need skillful authors like Najwa Barakat to show us parts of the world we’re living in. I was very interested in your Translator’s Note at the end of the book, talking about the challenge hidden in Arabic verb tenses. But syntax is also a challenge, not least because of the incompatibility between Arabic and English. To that effect, you certainly made your choices and detours, but the end result reads incredibly smoothly in English. How wide is the margin you usually give to yourself as a translator, to “foreignize”—if you want—the English language?
LL: I seldom get to talk about the specific translation choices that I make, because I don’t often speak with other Arabic speakers who are reading the novel at that level of detail. For instance, most of the editors or copyeditors that have had a hand in this book don’t know Arabic, so sometimes their suggestions are graceful but a little inaccurate. The challenge of Arabic verb tenses and Arabic syntax is in approaching English from such a radically different origin point.
In constructing this text in the English language, I think about the kind of connections, the resonances and texture that’s being assembled. The interrogation is always: does it make sense? Is it true to the original in some way?
I wish I had a perfect knowledge of Arabic language and Arabic culture to consider each aspect—important connections within the Arabic, instant references for naturalized speakers—and consider how I can bring those, or something similar, into English. What readers are getting in translations are literary works that have been derived from, or intimately related to, a work of art in a foreign language, but ultimately the translation is something different, and each reader reading the English text, just as those who read the Arabic text, is going to get something different.
As for the question of foreignization, I know some people see translation as a way of enriching the English language by bringing in things that haven’t been said before, but it’s something I’m not entirely sure about yet. In terms of my own translation philosophy, my focus has often been on the narratives, the characters, the message of the author. It’s less about changing or influencing the English language, and more about what can be said in language at all. I think in this particular work, the Arabic style is very smooth and intricate; there’s a lot of looping back and around. In that way, I use English literary techniques to create the experience I have reading the Arabic.
CK: You are now translating a third work by Najwa Barakat: The Bus (Baas al-Awaadem), which is another sociological surgery of Arab misery, unravelling on a bus that loses its way while on a trip from northern to southern Lebanon. Would you be able to share some details of the book with us?
LL: When I was first introduced to Najwa, my teacher and friend Khaled talked about Baas al-Awaadem as being her best well known book, but Najwa had somebody else in mind to translate it. Then, for whatever reason, it didn’t work out at that time. At the time of its publication, it won prizes and was very well reviewed, and twenty years later, people are still talking about it. It’s a novel that was very influential in contemporary Arabic literature, so it’s very exciting to finally be bringing it into English.
It’s a fast novel—I think of it as an Arabic Canterbury Tales. There’s about a dozen characters going on a journey together; each has a story, and there’s also this frame story that kind of draws out and creates tensions between them. Each character presents themselves one way, but then has a different truth underneath. They’re all lying to each other, and maybe to themselves as well. It is a very critical view of different human traits and the different ways society can be structured—and a very fun book to read as well. So I’m very excited for that project.
Luke Leafgren is an Assistant Dean of Harvard College. He has published five translations of Arabic novels, and received the 2018 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation for his English edition of Muhsin Al-Ramli’s The President’s Gardens.
Carol Khoury is an Editor-at-Large at Asymptote, a translator and editor, and the Managing Editor at the Jerusalem Quarterly.
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Read more on the Asymptote blog:
- Unexpired Bodies: On Malika Moustadraf’s Blood Feast
- Translation Tuesday: “Foal” by Mohamed Makhzangi
- A Translator’s Humility: An Interview with Leri Price