Nouha Homad

Nouha is a translator, poet, artist, and teacher. She translates from Arabic, Spanish, and French into English, and from English into French. Click here to access her profile in the LTAC directory, and access her website here to view some of her selected artworks.

1. What are you reading at the moment and would you recommend it?

Right now, I’ve fallen back on rereading: Mikhail Bakhtin Rabelais and his World (trans. by Hélène Iswolsky); Alisdair Gray Lanark: A Life in Four Books; Barack Obama Dreams of My Father; David Lodge After Bakhtin: Essays on Fiction and Criticism. All very recommended.
Terminé : BD de David Sala Le Joueur d’échecs (d’après Stefan Zweig) et Manifesto, de Julian Rosefeldt (ce tome document le projet avec textes collages). Les deux sont très recommandés.

2. Do you read translations? More specifically, do you read translations in the language from which you translate?

Yes, I do. I read in translation the works of authors who write in languages I do not speak. But I also read translations of works in languages I’m fluent in. I love to see how other translators translate. I learn from them what to do, and what not to do.

3. Are you working on anything at the moment ?

Sur plusieurs textes : Tout d’abord, j’essaie de finaliser la traduction de trois romans : deux romans des auteurs argentins, donc de l’espagnol vers l’anglais, et un roman d’une auteure syrienne, de l’arabe vers l’anglais. Deux maisons d’éditions aux États Unis y sont intéressées. Je travaille aussi sur une collection de mes nouvelles.

4. What was your first translation? How did this experience impact your career?

Ah! When I was about twelve, my sister gave me Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights for my birthday. My father then gave me a French translation of the same novel (cannot remember who the translator was). I was so taken with both the novel and the way it was translated that, some years later, I attempted a translation of my own. That experience certainly marked how I saw translation and people in general since!

5. If you could travel back in time to the start of your career, what advice would you give yourself?

Je suis vraiment nulle à donner des conseils ! Mais sérieusement, c’est une question bien difficile. Je crois que chaque étape dans ma vie se caractérise par un ensemble unique de circonstances.

6. What is your dream project? In other words, if you could choose any book to be translated, regardless of publishing rights, or if the text had already been translated, what would it be?

1- Geoffrey Chaucer Troilus and Criseyde
2- le roman court de Carson McCullers’s The Ballad of the Sad Café. It’s an under-appreciated little gem!
3- les BD de Didier Comès.

7. What is your chief characteristic as a translator?

Curiosité. Et une passion à apprendre et à découvrir. Je ne suis jamais satisfaite. La vie est courte.

8. What is the quality you most like in a translator?

Une grande sensibilité envers ce qu’on traduit, envers l’autre culture. Et la fidélité de transmettre autant que possible l’esprit des écrits.

9. What is your main flaw as a translator?

I have many. The principal one is I’m niggly. I spend an enormous chunk of time researching a tiny detail.

10. What is it that you most dislike in translations?

La médiocrité, l’arrogance, la stupidité.

11. What is your current state of mind?

Bon, en général. La chaleur humaine me manque énormément : de pouvoir rire, converser, partager mes idées, manger, prendre un coup avec des ami/es.

12. For what fault have you most tolerance?

Les fautes qui sont reconnues avec humilité par la personne qui les commet.

13. What is your favourite motto?

Ruffle fewer feathers and keep more people happy.