I am certified!

In September I went to Madison, Wisconsin to take the ATA (American Translators Association) certification exam. There were about 20 of us taking it at one of the university facilities. Many language pairs were represented. Spanish and French were the most common. I may have been the only person there doing German-English. Until recently, ATA… Continue reading I am certified!

Emma vs. Effi

Last month I read Madame Bovary for the first time. Afterwards I decided to re-read Effi Briest, having read it about 20 years ago at St. Andrews. I used to think of Effi Briest as “the German Madame Bovary” just because it was a realist novel about an adulterous wife, but really they’re quite different. One could write… Continue reading Emma vs. Effi

Metaphors that make you go WTF?

With regard to Goethe’s play Götz von Berlichingen, “Lessing, who had just held up his own newly published Emilia Galotti as a model of how a stage-play should be constructed, was bitter; he exclaimed angrily that Goethe had filled sausage skins with sand and sold them as rope.”

Most people have a cold.

I do have a cold. I powered through it during Christmas preparations but spent the Feast of Stephen in bed. And that’s where I’d be today, as well, if there weren’t things to do. Most people have a cold in one of my favorite poems: Weltende, by Jakob van Hoddis. Good old Raymond Furness of St. Andrews… Continue reading Most people have a cold.