Free Word

Aimed at early career translators.

A lecture with Helen Stevenson who was longlisted for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize with Alain Mabanckou for Black Moses. She will share her experience, practice, and advice, and discuss the collaborative work it takes to produce an outstanding book in translation.

With support from the Booker Prize Foundation

This session will look at how the career of the literary translator as we know it has been changing over the last year through new opportunities, working models and self-initiated sidelines.

Coming together to discuss the significance, importance and, in some cases, necessity of these new developments will be British Library Translator in Residence Jen Calleja, Ruth Clarke of new translation collective The Starling Bureau, and a member of Shadow Heroes, a project bringing translation into schools, and Shadow Heroes co-founder Gitanjali Patel. The panel will be chaired

by Writers’ Centre Norwich’s International Director, Kate Griffin.

Join translator and academic Amanda Hopkinson who will present three South American authors she has worked with who never intended to address human rights in their work, but found

it impossible not to.

Professor Alison Phipps, lead researcher on Researching Multilingually at the Borders of Language: the Body, Law and the State at the University of Glasgow, will discuss the real life interactions that migrants face when fleeing their home countries. She will be joined by the project’s poet in residence Tawona Sitholé. Chris Gribble joins the panel in his role as the chair of the board of International Cities of Refuge Network (ICORN).

Samantha Schnee, Founding Editor of Words Without Borders, will chair the session.

With support from the AHRC “Translating Cultures” theme

What are the specific challenges of translating poetry? Who is best equipped to do it - the solo translator, co-translators or even collaborative groups - and why? How do you best engage with a

source text, and how do you ensure that the end result ‘lives and breathes’ in the target language? Does it matter whether poetry translations are ‘marketable’, or do they exist primarily to further

academic research? And could translation be a part of the UK’s poetry ‘renaissance’?

Join practising translator and academic Sophie Collins, Literature Across Frontiers director Alexandra Büchler and Poetry Book Society manager Alice Mullen to mull over the big issues of the day

for poetry in translation. Chaired by Erica Jarnes, managing director of the Poetry Translation Centre.

This plenary panel will examine the UK’s changing demographics, and what they might tell us about who translators are and where we might find them. How has the make-up of our cities changed?

Will translators of the future be drawn mostly from second-generation urban immigrants rather than(as in the past) primarily anglophones with modern languages degrees? Will Brexit make things worse, or better? How well is the diversity of our contemporary culture currently reflected in the translation profession, and what can we do to improve the breadth of that representation?

With Sarah Ardizzone, Vanni Bianconi, Adrian Blackledge and Francisca McNeill, chaired by Erica Jarnes, managing director of the Poetry Translation Centre.

With support from the AHRC “Translating Cultures” theme

On 13 March 2017, author Bakhtiyar Ali introduced his book I Stared at the Night of the City, a lyrical interpretation of contemporary Kurdistan with a kaleidoscope of unreliable narrators.

Featuring: Bakhtiyar Ali, Kareem Abdulrahman, Hassan Abdulrazzak and Alexandra Büchler

Wanderlust: Great Literature from Around the World is a monthly event series at Free Word.

To explore the Wanderlust events we’ve held so far and read about (and around) some of the books we’ve featured, click here: www.freewordcentre.com/explore/projects/wanderlust

On 16 February 2017, 89up launched They're Your Rights: Fight For Them rally was the official launch of a report on human rights post-Brexit, authored by Sashy Nathan following a successful crowdfunded campaign last year.

Following the UK Supreme Court Miller judgment and before the triggering of Article 50, this event aimed to rally people around the notion of their rights in an increasingly unstable world.

Listen to short speeches from:

Actor and activist Sam West

Women’s rights campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez

Dr Fergal Davis, constitutional law expert from King’s College London

Emma Hughes, environmental activist at Platform

Sashy Nathan, director of advocacy at 89up

Carly Nyst, digital rights campaigner

The whole event was broadcasted live by 89up on They’re Your Rights’ Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/Theyre-Your-Rights-Fight-For-Them-721376228022391/

On 13 February 2017, German writer Steven Uhly discussed his new book, a thrilling epic novel of resettlement, with the translator of the English version, Jamie Bulloch.

Featuring: Jamie Bulloch and Steven Uhly.

Wanderlust: Great Literature from Around the World is a monthly event series from Free Word. Listen to writers and translators from around the world and hear them talk about their creative work.

To explore the Wanderlust events and books we've held so far, click here: www.freewordcentre.com/explore/projects/wanderlust

On 16 January 2017, Polish writer Wioletta Greg introduced her book Swallowing Mercury, the tale of a girl growing up in communist Poland and trying to make sense of it in her own way.

Featuring: Wioletta Greg, Eliza Marciniak and Marta Dziurosz

Wanderlust: Great Literature from Around the World is a monthly event series at Free Word.

To explore the Wanderlust events we’ve held so far and read about (and around) some of the books we’ve featured, click here: www.freewordcentre.com/explore/projects/wanderlust

Listen to stories, poems and discussion looking at our rapidly changing world and what action we can take to help our environment and each others.

Readings of new work by: Justina Hart, Emma Howell, Darragh Martin, Sarah Thomas and David Thorpe.

Professor Harriet Bulkeley, Durham University, spoke with two of the writers and Dr Jane Ridiford, co-founder of Global Generation to look at how stories can help encourage action.

Then Global Generation, which works to build community between each other and the natural world, took everyone through a free writing exercise with energising results.

This event was presented by TippingPoint, Free Word and Durham University, with additional funding from ESRC and Arts Council England on Thursday 19 January 2017.