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phaedraismyusername · 2 years

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Just chucking my 10 pence into the ring for Women in Translation month with a handful of recs on the off chance it'll be of use to someone

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

- a short novel about a Korean woman who decides to become a vegetarian after a bad dream and how the people (mainly men) around her react to the decision and her subsequent spiral into stranger and stranger behaviour.

Convenience Store Woman by Sakaya Murata

- the story follows a neuro-divergent middle aged Japanese woman who loves her job at a convenience store more than anything and just wants to be left alone to do what makes her happy and how the people around her pressure her into conforming to what society expects from her (finding a man, getting a "real job", etc) and how those expectations negatively impact her life.

Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin

- a strange winding Argentinian novel about a dying woman and a young boy sitting in hospital together and telling stories. I don't really know the best way to sell you on this one other than you'll have to try it to know if you'll like it lol. But if you like a whole lot of weird and appreciate narratives and themes around environmental abuse then this could be for you.

Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

- another Argentinian book but this time it's just a straight up consumption horror lol. It follows a man who works at an abattoir essentially in a dystopian society where animal meat is now poisonous to people so they've started breeding and mass-processing humans for meat instead. Does what it says on the tin and pulls absolutely no punches in the process lol.

Confessions by Kanae Minato

- an excellent little Japanese thriller. A class room of teenagers are sat down by their teacher on her last day of work to talk about her resignation after her young daughter died in an accident on school grounds, only for her to reveal that she knows that two of the students are responsible for her death, and the steps she's taken to set her revenge into motion. The rest of the book jumps pov every chapter as you watch the consequences ripple out from there.

and last but not least

Vagabonds by Hao Jingfang

- a Chinese sci-fi novel that follows a group of Mars-born teenagers who, after a civil war between planets, have spent their formative years on Earth as delegates and are now returning to Mars and how they deal with that, basically. It's the longest book on this list by far at around 600 pages but the writing is beautiful and the conversations about Mars being a communist ideal while Earth has reached the pinnacle of what capitalism can create are done in a way that doesn't feel at all soapbox-y and feels very fair in exploring the pros and cons of each system. Just an all around excellent book.

#women in translation #wit month #book recs #the vegetarian #convenience store woman #confessions #vagabonds #tender is the flesh #fever dream #sakaya murata #kanae minato #samantha schweblin #han kang #hao jingfang #agustina bazterrica #books #recs

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whilereadingandwalking · 8 months

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have been slowly chugging my way through The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu, translated by Edward G. Seidensticker. I started with the version pictured, which I bought in Japan, then paused, made an elaborate family tree/character chart (which was deeply necessary) and started from the beginning with the full, unabridged Everyman's Library edition. It's a gorgeous book and lowkey more readable than many of our much, much later classics.

Considered the very first novel ever written, published before 1021, Tale of Genji was written by a woman who had a place at the court in Kyoto. I purchased my copy in Tokyo, and then carried it with me throughout our visit to Kyoto, from the old Gion neighborhood and Shirakawa Lane to the golden temple Kinkakuji and gorgeous Arashiyama Bamboo Grove. I've always meant to dig into the first-ever novel, and I've been surprised by how accessible it is.

I'm now around 520 pages in, and taking a break to catch up on my other reading. Only 664 pages to go!

#the tale of genji #murasaki shikibu #women in translation #wit month #books in translation #japanese lit

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morebedsidebooks · 9 months

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10 Must Read Titles by Women in Translation

In honour of Women in Translation Month here are some of the impressive women writers from around the globe I’ve read.

All Men Want to Know by Nina Bouraoui, translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins

Across countries, cultures, and identity the lesbian French-Algerian author delivers a vivid autofiction novel moving from child to adult.

Another Love by Erzsébet Galgóczi, translated from the Hungarian by Ines Rieder and Felice Newman

This political historical crime novella about the death of a journalist is famously the basis for a lesbian cult film in the 1980s.

Cinnamon by Samar Yazbek, translated from the Arabic by Emily Danby

Power and trauma where one fumbles around trying to grasp what control or dominance, or the illusion of such, can be had and how this could influence people is center stage in this story of an affluent but stifled Damascus wife sexually grooming her maid.

Girls Lost by Jessica Schiefauer, translated from the Swedish by Saskia Vogel

A dark YA fairytale-like coming-of-age novel utilizing gender transformation to say something about sexism, identity, and perception.

Jawbone by Mónica Ojeda, translated from the Spanish by Sarah Booker

Literary fiction segues itself into thrilling horror in this challenging novel trying to say something among anxiety and violence about purity, mothers and daughters, teachers and students, best friends and maybe more.

Last Night in Nuuk by Niviaq Korneliussen, translated from the Danish version (from Greenlandic by the author) by Anna Halager

A contemporary debut novel with a cast of queer twenty-somethings set during spring in Greenland’s capital city and a night that changes so much.

Paradise Rot by Jenny Hval, translated from the Norwegian by Marjam Idriss

A bizarre and sensual eco-gothic debut novel featuring a foreign college student adapting to the immersion of a new surroundings, culture, diet, and language with a suffusing ennui and a (queer) sexual consciousness.

Sparkling Rain, translated from the Japanese by Ronni Alexander, Kimberly Hughes, Claire Maree, Barbara Summerhawk and Laurie Walters

An important anthology of Japanese fiction around women who love women covering some history and selections of works from 1912 into the new millennium.

To the Warm Horizon by Choi Jin-Young, translated from the Korean by Soje

This post-apocalyptic novel imagining the aftermath of an immensely deadly pandemic is filled with what people lose and leave, while trying to show something that humans can find and still hold onto. In this case love, including a love between two women.

The Wandering by Intan Paramaditha, translated from the Indonesian by Stephen J. Epstein

A fantasy travel novel unfolding in untraditional fashion by the device of readers choosing their own route, but at the same time paths countless others have taken before them.

#Women in translation #wit month #favourite women authors

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mayhemspreadingguy · 1 month

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Lost boys

#mayhem art #star wars #anakin skywalker #obi wan kenobi #anakin skywalker fanart #obi wan kenobi fanart #star wars art #this one was sitting in my drafts for about a month. idk why I was holding onto it -cries- anyway #this is shortly after Qui-Gon's death. Both of their lives just got flipped upside down. Anakin is traumatized by having to leave #his mother behind‚ then his Master's sudden death‚ and he's left with no certainty in his future.#Obi-Wan just witnessed his Master die‚ helplessly‚ then having to take care of this little human in his Master's stead‚ meanwhile feeling #wholly inadequate to be so suddenly knighted let alone immediately becoming a Master and taking responsibility for another being.#Both of them losing the constants in their lives. left uprooted. the only anchoring point being each other.#I imagine Obi-Wan wouldn't reach out to Anakin first‚ but if Anakin expressed compassion with him‚ grief‚ and his need to feel secure‚#Obi-Wan wouldn't turn him away #this was just my excuse to give them a proper soothing hug in their time of mourning

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gray-licious · 11 months

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isn't this just sterek things?

#sterek #teen wolf #this bitch is back just for this prompt 🤡#happy pride month 🏳️‍🌈#sterek fanart #derek hale #stiles stilinski #fanart #stiles probably committed the crime while derek witnessed and got arrested together just for being there 🤝#lets pretend derek can take photos just this time #i got bored so i wont even try to finish and just post this art :)

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callixspod · 4 months

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How would you guys feel if I'm currently planning on making an animatic (WIP)

#i love tom cardy's music #i might as well shift it into something im currently enjoying and its this #just hope that ill be able to finish this in a month 😭#oh and medics dad will be here #wit my own design #aha #tf2 #team fortress 2 #team fortress 2 fanart #shitpost #tf2 shitpost #i think it counts as a shitpost #red octoberfest #red oktoberfest #heavymedic #heavy x medic #heavy #medic #mixed messagessss

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razberrypuck · 6 months

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I think what's driving me insane about this specific arc for qcharlie is watching him slowly become more and more horrified at what's going on with the infection. he keeps brushing it off, and saying he's just going to let it run its course, and that if he has to change to be happy and to keep the people he loves safe, he'll be whatever he HAS to be.

but over the course of this stream, he's become increasingly aware and afraid of what's happening to him. his memory goes fuzzy when his body glitches out. he noticed the infection had spread even more, on his own, and quietly said "oh no." he spoke to maximus about the infection, and jumped from being relatively open about it to scrambling to change the subject when baghera asked what they were talking aboug. he started freaking out when all the glitching and the binary spread to the very land he lived on, and struggled to calm himself down.

and I think, after talking to maximus, he's realizing how much worse his infection is, even if maxo and etoiles have had theirs longer. I think, in the back of his mind, he KNOWS what's happening to him is codeflippa's fault, and that thought scares him more than the infection itself.

denial is something that charlie is very good at. but he's at the end of his rope. he has been for a long time. so I wonder how much more he can withstand before all of this just breaks him.

#he CANNOT catch a break #he CANNOT take a breather #first it was marriage problems; self-hatred; the death of his daughter; months of total isolation; falling into agonizing numbness #FINALLY starting to heal; having all of that progress ripped away from him #and now he has to witness the horror of losing HIMSELF too.#i promise you. he cant take much more of this.#qsmp #qsmp charlie slimecicle #qsmp charlie #qsmp slimecicle

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skunkes · 7 months

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i did a pretty good job i think

#i like how nicely talons nose apex and ala formed the kitty nose #usually i struggle with animals with more visible nostrils when a character has less visible ones #in the case of al but his cow form has never felt like a total misrepresentation of his human form ykwim...igts so fitting #also i cant draw talon as nicely as i did on that first day of september and ive been drawing him all month aroo #talkys #a doodley #still have to find a way to incorporate talon's lips somehow...that was easy wit cow al

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whaliiwatching · 9 months

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annual winners of most annoying couple award

#spider man: into the spiderverse #spider punk #spider noir #hobie brown #noirpunk #they are married and it is OBNOXIOUS #yeah they could be lowkey with pda #or they could be the couple everyone both envies and despises #takes like eight months for them to get there but they Get There #hobie is already naturally affectionate and noir isn’t far behind #i just think.. they are… so lovely #im getting better at drawing his wicks!! aaa!!!#or at least i rlly like how i did em here #theyr in LOVE in love….#debating whether they signed the papers and had a stranger as a witness for a wedding..#or if they didn’t have one/arent legally married (since neither of them can in their worlds)#and just don’t care. fuck the government :)

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phaedraismyusername · 2 years

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Finished Paradise Rot by Jenny Hval as my first Women in Translation book of the month. It follows the sexual exploration of a Norwegian student while she's studying abroad in Australia and if I had to pick one word to describe it I would choose sticky

#the descriptors in this book are all heavy on the senses #as someone who struggles with textures irl the tactile ones were a lot lol #wit month #women in translation #book recs #jenny hval #paradise rot

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whilereadingandwalking · 11 months

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In Vitro: On Longing and Transformation by Isabel Zapata, translated by Robin Myers, is a poetic, rich meditation on the painful and difficult process of IVF and pregnancy. She evokes ghosts and secrecy, the stunning sexism of the medical system, pain physical and mental, and much more in her journey to have a child. She highlights all the strangeness of the process of eggs, hormones, development, and of the yearning to become a mother, of labor, of the sense of self, of anxiety. It's a really gorgeous short read about a deep topic that packs a ton of depth in fewer than 150 pages. Highly recommended.

Content warnings for misogyny, medical trauma and dismissal, miscarriage.

#in vitro #isabel zapata #bookworm #books in translation #nonfiction books #wit month #my book reviews

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loupy-mongoose · 16 days

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If anyone's interested, I took pictures of the eclipse. My phone's camera doesn't do NEARLY justice to the totality, but I tried. ;w;

(Putting them under a bar because there's a lot and it long)

Pictures should be in order of the sun's disappearance progress. Pics were taken through eclipse glasses, except for the totality. Couldn't see the sun through them at that point!

We had a thin cloud layer that thankfully went away as it went on. Made for some cool images. :>

And... totality.

Can see some planets, in the middle of the day! :3

Again, the camera doesn't capture it like I wish it could, but it was a literal night and day difference in the lighting.

(During totality vs. right after the light came back)

And a random attempt at taking a pic streaked, I have no idea how it happened. XD

#I mentioned that the eclipse would probably be my JotM this month.#Yeah... I'm gonna have to say a big yeah on that...#It was... one of the most AMAZING things I've been able to witness in my life.#There are better pics than mine out there.#But here be my experience. ^^

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morebedsidebooks · 9 months

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The Third Day by Chochana Boukhobza

The only time she came alive was when she was playing the cello. The moment she bowed her head towards her instrument, the greyness vanished, light entered her gaze and her body came alive.

From Chochana Boukhobza an awarded winning Jewish author her novel The Third Day, translated by Alison Anderson, despite coverage in many outlets has appeared to gain little traction with many readers. Set in the 1980s, the story unfolds over three days in Jerusalem following two Israeli women cellists of different generations. Absent for years living in the US, Elisheva is a holocaust survivor who hasn’t truly escaped and is out for revenge against a Nazi. Unaware of her plans Is her protégée Rachel a 23-year-old who left family, and love to pursue her musical dreams. With their arrival back for a concert with the city’s Philharmonic Orchestra it also becomes clear the great value of playing music in both characters’ lives. Music after all allows us to reside and express something different than in words alone. Too winding through the city, characters, and memories the book works into a reflective thriller very much concerned with history, shared and more personal, and what the past may mean for the present and future.

The Third Day by Chochana Boukhobza is available in English, translated by Alison Anderson, in print and digital from MacLehose Press

#french literature #the third day #chochana boukhobza #le troisième jour #wit month #francophone50 #cw: fatphobia sexism infidelity blood murder antisemitism suicidal thoughts mass murder torture pregnancy hospitalization

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darewolfcreates · 5 months

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