Absinthe Volume 29: Translating Jewish Multilingualisms

The editors of Absinthe: World Literature in Translation are pleased to announce the launch of our new issue, Translating Jewish Multilingualisms.

Edited by Marina Mayorski and Maya Barzilai, Absinthe 29 presents a collection of historically overlooked literary works from writers across the world. Featuring poetry and prose, fiction and nonfiction, this issue is home to the first English-language translations of a range of texts originally composed in seven languages: Yiddish, Spanish, Ladino, Hebrew, Portuguese, Czech, and Judeo-Arabic.

In Absinthe 29, the work of seasoned translators such as Anita Norich, Jessica Kirzane, Yardenne Greenspan, Adriana X. Jacobs, and Nesi Altaras appear alongside that of U-M faculty Devi Mays and Ruth Tsoffar, as well as students Júlia Irion Martins, Denisa Glacova, and Arianna Afsari. Each contribution to the collection is accompanied by a critical reflection written by its translator. 

Translating Jewish Multilingualism is at once a celebration of the rich and often under-examined legacies of Jewish writing, as well as a striking testament to the conditions that have underwritten Jewish life since the late-19th century. Its contents shed light on strategies of Jewish community-formation across space, time, and dialect. The issue more generally broaches the themes of religion, migration, class, gender, love and marriage, and it pays particular—but not exclusive—attention to the accounts of women writers in its bringing-together of Jewish writing since 1884.

This issue is available for purchase here.