My Father Thinks I'm a Fakir (Paperback) | Released: 08 Feb 2019

This book is published by Floricanto Press.

www.FloricantoPress.com

www.LatinoBooks.com

#LatinobooksClaudia Apablaza (born October 20, 1978) is a multi-award-winning Chilean writer of literary fiction. After studying psychology at the University of Chile, she obtained her master's degree in literary theory from the same university. Later, she won a scholarship from the National Council of Culture and the Arts in 2006 and continued her postgraduate studies in comparative literature at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Known for her erotic narratives, she has authored several books, including Siempre te creíste la Virginia Woolf (2011), Goø y el amor (2012), Todos piensan que soy un faquir (2013), and most recently, Diario de quedar embarazada (2017). English translations of her fiction have appeared in Gargoyle Magazine, Hayden's Ferry Review, Muumuu House, St. Petersburg Review, and Yalobusha Review. "I Think I Made You Up Inside My Head," an excerpt from her 2012 novel Goø y el amor, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2014. This title, My Father Seems Think I'm a Fakir, is her first book to appear in English.In the cultural context in which we live today, few exercises could be more futile than literary translation. In our increasingly digitized society dominated by visual rather than textual media, very few of us ever read literature, let alone international fiction. I, for one, have become so absorbed in some other activities, such as listening to music online, watching movies online, and checking email like an addict, that I read only what I translate. Yet, I continue to translate as a means of resistance against Western hegemony over identity, however pointless and irrational it may appear to be.One of the main reasons why I translate Claudia is that I feel a strong affinity for her work in spite of our obvious differences. So much so that, I even began to think I could be one of her characters while working on this project. To Claudia, writing is a complex, intimate process, and that is exactly what translation feels like to me, at least sometimes. She considers literature as a critique of something, and has been vocal about the marginalization of women writers in her country's male-dominated publishing industry. Unbeknown to her, in a moment of brave madness, I chose her as my ally in my counter-hegemonic struggle. Also, Claudia and I are both products of globalization. Like many of her fictional counterparts, both of us have lived and worked in different countries. Her books have been published in diverse countries such as Spain, Peru, Mexico, in addition to Chile, her native country, and this short story collection is her first book in the U.S. Wherever I email her, she seems to be in a different part of the world. Sometimes we are in the same time zone, but at others times we are a whole world apart from each other.As a literary translator, my primary task is to attempt to make foreign fiction available to English-speaking readers. Thus, I have become an unwilling agent of the hegemonic language through the rendering of non-English texts into English, although this is an unintended consequence of my action. It is, however, ironically fitting because it symbolizes my unrequited love for the languages I work with, which constantly reject me as a displaced outsider in our ever more globalized world.Last but not least, my sincere thanks are extended to Edicola Ediciones, Claudia's original publisher, and her editor Paolo Primavera, who has championed cutting-edge fiction like hers.-Toshiya Kamei, 2018