MARCH 27TH RESPONSE - AUDREE

Julia Sanches Talk

I really enjoyed Julia Sanches' presentation. I found the translation metaphors to be a fun way to open, and I definitely was partial to the "squeezing a jellyfish" one. 

It was good to hear her talk about pronouns, because that is one thing that we spoke about in regards to the reading. The explanation she gave about Spanish being a language where the pronoun does not have to be stated every time additionally to the fact that the author deliberately chose to not name her characters, made a lot of sense to me and explained why sometimes it was hard to follow the subject of the sentence. 

I also found it interesting that she watched TV shows like "PEN15" and "Derry Girls" for slang inspiration when translating a text that was written in a Rio dialect. 

The Bird is a Raven

I enjoyed this short novel, even though at times it was quite uncomfortable to read. Both Paul and Henry seem to have quite disconcerting views of women and sex, and the way they talk about it so openly with each other was disturbing but also kept me intrigued in the stories of these bizarre characters. Women in this story were so heavily and obviously being observed under the "male gaze" but the novel itself seemed very aware of that. I am still unsure as to what Paul meant when he describes Henry as a raven, and why this is the title of this book. 

I noticed a few times where either Henry or Paul would use the word "like" in the middle of their sentences just as people often do in everyday speech, which I felt added to the realism of the dialogue, especially as they are both supposed to be quite young. I wonder if the German equivalent of "like" has the same connotation in German as it does in English (quite youthful, not very proper etc). The writing was very simple but very evocative and clear. Although there weren't many elaborate descriptions, the scenery, specifically the train compartment, was very clearly visible to me in my head.