Photo: Harvard University Press
Translations of short stories by the Prague German-language writer come out this week. Entitled Selected Stories, the collection is the work of Mark Harman, an Irish-born, US-resident academic who has been described as “the finest living Kafka translator” into English. From his home in Pennsylvania, Professor Harman discussed many aspects of the author’s work, including his distinctive style, his sense of humour and where he stands in the literary pantheon.
The novelist John Banville, no less, has called you the greatest living Kafka translator. How did your connection to Kafka begin in the first place?
“I used to hate the question ‘What brought you to Kafka?’ It was a rather defensive response. When people would ask me the exact same question you just asked me I would say, Well, there are scholarly, literary reasons – it’s none of your, beeswax, in a way [laughs].
See the rest here.
Author: Ian Willoughby