Tag: Angela Merkel

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Episode 207 – Garth Greenwell

Virtual Memories Show 207: Garth Greenwell

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“Speaking a language inexpertly makes language visible, and malleable. You become aware of language not just as a medium but as matter itself, as something you manipulate, as something you have to work with.”

Garth Greenwell joins the show to talk about the poetics of cruising (and cruising’s great leveling potential) both in his life and in his debut novel What Belongs to You, the hyper-masculine culture and homophobia of Bulgaria, his concern that contemporary English-language writers don’t read in other languages (or read in translation), his role chairing the 2017 Festival Neue Literatur, the dangers of LGBTQ mainstreaming, the fragility of cosmopolitanism, the state of queer fiction, and our mutual admiration of Samuel R. Delany! Give it a listen! And go buy What Belongs to You: A Novel!

“I wanted in this book to create a space where I could think about what shame feels like to an open and proud gay man.”

Bonus: This episode is also part of our media partnership with Festival Neue Literatur, which is taking place March 2-5 in New York City! Garth’s the chairperson for the event! Go attend! Maybe I’ll see you there!

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes!

Lots of ways to follow The Virtual Memories Show! iTunes, Twitter, Instagram, Soundcloud, Facebook, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Garth Greenwell is the author of What Belongs to You, which was longlisted for the National Book Award and shortlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the LA Times Book Prize. A New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice, it was named a Best Book of 2016 by The New York Times, The New Yorker, Publishers Weekly, and over 50 other publications. His work has appeared in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, the London Review of Books, and elsewhere. He lives in Iowa City.

Credits: This episode’s music is Nothing’s Gonna Bring Me Down by David Baerwald, used with permission from the artist. The conversation was recorded at the apartment of Jeff Nunokawa on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 Microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photo of Mr. Greenwell by me. It’s on my instagram.

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Episode 108 – From Asterix to Zweig

Virtual Memories Show:
Anthea Bell – From Asterix to Zweig

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“There were a lot of books in the school library, and they weren’t in English, and I was mad keen to get at them.”

Renowned literary translator Anthea Bell joins the show to talk about getting her start in foreign languages, the schisms in the world of literary translation, the most challenging authors she’s worked on, the one language she’d love to learn, translating everything from Asterix to Zweig, and more! Give it a listen!

“Heinrich Heine goes into English with almost suspicious ease, but Goethe is very, very difficult.”

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We also talk about where she thinks WG Sebald’s fiction would have gone had he not died so early, why Asterix has never gotten over in America, the one word that’s the bane of her existence for U.S./UK split editions, her worries for the future of translation, her family’s history during the War, and her theory for why Asterix’s druid-pal should keep the name “Getafix”!

“If we had to have the Romantic period — and I do say we did, although I like the Enlightenment a lot better — I say the Germans did it better than anyone.”

We talk about a ton of books in this episode, so here’s a handy guide!

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes! You might like:

Follow The Virtual Memories Show on iTunes, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Anthea Bell is a freelance translator from German and French. Her translations include works of non-fiction; modern literary and popular fiction; books for young people including the Asterix the Gaul strip cartoon series; and classics by E.T.A. Hoffmann, Freud, Kafka and Stefan Zweig. She has won several translation awards.

Credits: This episode’s music is Where Are We Now? by David Bowie. The conversation was recorded at Ms. Bell’s home on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Blue Yeti USB Microphone. Processing was done in Audacity and Logic Pro. Photo of Ms. Bell by me.