Who Am I to Judge? On Reviewing Works in Translation

Many American critics shy from reviewing translations. Sometimes, this is a manifestation of self-doubt; others, of doubt that a translator can really create a work worth writing about. Of course, the latter is pernicious, but it has the same result as the former: less attention, less critique, and less respect for translated literature.

For the past nine years, I have tried to resist this impulse—in book culture and in myself. I write regularly about translations, which is so rare that, although I have never had a staff reviewing job and have rarely been a full-time critic, I am, by default, one of the country’s most prolific translation critics. I want this to stop being true! My hope is to have much more competition on my beat in three years than I do now. “Who Am I to Judge” will explore my strategies for reviewing books originally written in languages I don’t speak while also making a case that the U.S. needs more translation critics for the health of not just our literary ecosystem, but our minds.