Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0005175, Tue, 13 Jun 2000 15:22:03 -0700

Subject
The Translingual Imagination (fwd)
Date
Body
From: Steven G. Kellman <kellman@lonestar.jpl.utsa.edu>

Please allow me to tout my own new book, THE TRANSLINGUAL
IMAGINATION, a study of authors who write in more than one language or in
a language other than their primary one. Nabokovians might be especially
interested in Chapter 5, "Nabokov and the Psychomorphology of Zemblan."

Steven G. Kellman
The University of Texas at San Antonio
San Antonio, Texas 78249-0644
(210) 458-5216
fax (210) 458-5672
kellman@lonestar.utsa.edu


The Translingual Imagination
by Steven G. Kellman

Hardcover - 160 pages (June 2000)
Univ of Nebraska Pr; ISBN: 0803227450

This book studies authors who switch languages.
It is difficult to write well even in one language. Yet a rich body of
translingual literature--by authors who write in more than one
language or in a language other than their primary one--exists. The
Translingual Imagination is a pioneering study of the phenomenon,
which is as ancient as the use of Arabic, Latin, Mandarin, Persian,
and Sanskrit as linguae francae. Colonialism, war, mobility, and the
aesthetics of alienation have combined to create a modern translingual
canon. Opening with an overview of this vast subject, The Translingual
Imagination then looks at the differences between ambilinguals--those
who write authoritatively in more than one language--and monolingual
translinguals--who write in only one language but not their native
one. The book analyzes the translingual situations of African and
Jewish authors and achievements by figures as varied as Antin,
Beckett, Begley, Coetzee, Conrad, Hoffman, Nabokov, and Sayles. This
is the first general study of the translingual phenomenon.