
Rediscovering One of the Wittiest Books Ever Written - benbreen
https://www.newyorker.com/books/second-read/rediscovering-one-of-the-wittiest-books-ever-written
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legerdemain
> Long forgotten by most... almost no English speakers in the twenty-first
> century have read it...

I'm surprised by the breathless tone of the opening paragraphs. Machado is a
central figure in the literature of Brazil. In English, he is obscure and
unread in the same way that other central figures of other national
literatures are obscure and unread. This is not unique to either Brazil or
Machado. Very few arbitrarily chosen readers in the US could name a national
literary figure from, say, Hungary or Finland. But if you consider only the
readers who are interested in world literature, Machado is certainly both
well-known and widely read.

~~~
dhosek
It varies on language. While Portuguese, Hungarian or Finnish authors are
largely unknown, authors writing in French, Spanish, German and Italian are
fairly well known.

~~~
CSSer
I was about to suggest this may also vary by subject, but using philosophy as
a case study it seems to at least somewhat hold water. I’ll use philosophy
only because I minored in undergrad, so I’m not an expert but I’m also a bit
more well versed than a laymen.

Anyway, I’ve extensively read Spinoza (Portuguese), Sartre/Beauvoir & Camus
(French), Kant (German), Aquinas & Boethius (Italian). I’d expect most others
with philosophy backgrounds to at the very least know these names and a
synopsis about them too. All that being said, I’m hard pressed to name a
Hungarian or Finnish philosopher. I wonder why these languages are less
prominent internationally in literature.

~~~
marton78
I think you're conflating "internationally" with "in the US". Hungarian
(Márai, Kertész, Esterházy), Czech (Kundera, Hrabal, Hašek), Polish
(Sienkiewicz, Lem) novels, for example, enjoy quite some popularity in German
translation.

~~~
dhosek
Possibly. I think some of that is a lingering cultural hangover of the Austro-
Hungarian empire (which is also reflected in the cuisine of the nations that
formerly composed said empire). My first reading of a Hungarian author in
translation was when I was in grad school studying under Tibor Fischer.
Despite it being my heritage, I only read Czech authors for the first time
when I was working on a novel set in 1900 Prague. On the flip side, I'm fluent
enough in Spanish now that I only read translations of authors writing in
Spanish unintentionally (I hadn't realized that _Optic Nerve_ was a
translation when I read it) in favor of reading them in the original.

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Unknoob
"The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas" and "Dom Casmurro", both by Machado de
Assis, were required reading during the last 3 years of school in Brazil. It
is common for college entrance exams to use the books as example for
questions.

I forgot most of the plot because I only read it for school, maybe I should
revisit it now that I no longer dread reading.

~~~
romwell
This must surely have been the best way to utterly destroy the book for all
Brazilians.

I don't dread reading, but I am realizing I have to re-read all of my Russian
poetry, because so little of it I could truly relate to at the age we were
forced to read it.

~~~
gen220
It’s funny you mention this. One of my best friends went to secondary school
in Moscow, a very nice one. I really enjoy reading Russian literature, and
whenever I talk to him he says the same as you. We were chatting about Dead
Souls, and he was like “you know, I have no idea who in their right mind gives
a ten year old Gogol and expects him to come away enlightened.”

One of my good friends at work was raised in Germany, and he has similar
things to say about Theodore Storm and Thomas Mann: “oh, that’s what all the
old people tried to get us to appreciate in grade school”.

Maybe we should raise our kids on Harry Potter and Twilight, so we can save
the good stuff for later :).

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ghostbrainalpha
"The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas,” by Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis is
the book.

It is about a love triangle. The plot is nothing special, but the writing
style is unique.

~~~
Johnjonjoan
Would you say it is deserving of this article? I plan to read it but fear I
may be disappointed due to the articles hype. A counterbalance would be
appreciated.

~~~
claudiojulio
I am Brazilian and I consider Machado de Assis the greatest Brazilian writer
of all time. Posthumous Memories is the first book of Realism, so it is highly
regarded. In fact, his stories are sometimes boring, but because of Assisi's
style it is worth reading. If you want to read a better example of the
author's work, I recommend reading Dom Casmurro. This book is a supreme
masterpiece with a captivating story and unique style.

~~~
SOLAR_FIELDS
Is there a lot of Portuguese specific wordplay that is lost in translation?
For instance, I loved Don Quixote but have read that the best English
translation, masterpiece as it is, pales in comparison to the Spanish
equivalent because of the loss in translation of language-specific jokes.

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fernly
The book is available free in Portuguese and in French from Gutenberg.org:
[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/9685](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/9685)

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pachico
Do you know if English or Spanish translations are any good? My Portuguese is
not good enough to enjoy a book.

~~~
magneticnorth
The article praises a new english translation by Flora Thomson-DeVeaux

~~~
legerdemain
That's because the article is a review of the translation.

Published book reviews are of two kinds. Either the publisher of a book gets
some magazine to print a review as a promotional tactic, or the book is
notorious enough on its own for magazines to review it, so that they can
capitalize on its notoriety.

In the case of the former, the review is a paid promotion, so it is invariably
positive. Regardless of how sincerely Dave Eggers loves Machado in general and
this translation in particular, he is still being paid to rhapsodize about
them.

You can take away the facts that there is a new translation of Bras Cubas and
that it is being actively promoted, in the New Yorker, by Dave Eggers. But
those are not, on their own, reliable signs that the new translation is good
or necessary.

~~~
gen220
This is a good insight. I’m still not sure whether I think the P&V
translations of the Russian classics are any better than the old ones, or
whether it’s the opportunity to fawn over the classics again that’s given them
such good reviews. Who doesn’t want a good excuse to read Dostoevsky again,
decades later? It makes it very hard to know which translations are “good”
without, well, reading them yourself.

I’ll also offer that quality is in the eye of the beholder. Different people
want different things, and the popular conception of good is a moving target.
Today, people seem to like a translation that borders on transliteration,
preserving archaic words and obscure metaphors as they were written. It’s a
fashion that’s subject to change.

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CoolGuySteve
Sounds kind of similar to Fortress Beseiged which is kind of like the Chinese
equivalent to Catch-22.

~~~
frio
Catch 22 is one of my favourite novels; thanks for the recommendation.

