Lisa Wilcut on I CAN OPEN IT FOR YOU

By Deborah Iwabuchi in Maebashi, Japan

On March 22, 2024, twenty-seven people from around the world joined us on Zoom as SCBWI Japan hosted Lisa Wilcut to talk about her translation of a new book by Shinsuke Yoshitake. Yoshitake has published many children’s books, most of which follow a single pithy theme and appear in a similar format. They are familiar to and loved by Japanese readers young and old, and make great gifts.

Things got interesting right away, when moderator Susan Jones, our SCBWI Japan translator coordinator, began by asking Lisa about the title. The beautifully alliterated Japanese title is Akira ga akete ageru kara, or “Akira will open it for you.” The main character is a little boy named Akira, and akete ageru is a polite way of offering to open something for someone. Since small Japanese children often refer to themselves by their names, the original title is an idiomatic phrase used by Japanese children Akira’s age.

Japanese title has alliteration, with the same character at the beginning of each line, including the name of the little boy, Akira.

The title presented by US publisher Chronicle Books is I Can Open It For You, while UK’s Thames Hudson published it as I Can Open That! In fact, it turns out that the name of the protagonist—Akira—is not used at all in either of the English versions of the book. This, we learned, is true of all Yoshitake’s English translations—rather than changing the name of the character to one familiar to readers, the text is translated without it. I might note here that, through text and illustrations, Yoshitake’s books actually lend themselves to this solution to the eternal issue of what to do about names in translation.

American edition title

Since Lisa did the translation in American English and was not involved in the adjustments made to the British version, I Can Open It For You was the one we heard about.

For the next part of the session, Kazumi Wilds, our Regional Illustrator Coordinator, read the Japanese version, followed by Lisa reading the English. Little Akira wants to grow up and be able to open things for himself and, more importantly, for others, rather than always being the one who gets helped. He thinks about all the things he might be able to open, both real and fantastic.

With each item he thinks about opening, Akira has a sound that goes with it—the sound of it opening. Which brings us to what Lisa described as the elephant in the room—onomatopoeia, a form of language that is very common in Japanese and wreaks fear in the heart of the J to E translator. How common is it? Well, I cannot spell “onomatopoeia” without looking it up, but the word in Japanese is simply gi’on, the same word used for “sound effect.” If used sparsely, these “sound effect” words can often be worked around in a translation, but for this book, onomatopoeia was at the heart of it.

Rico Komanoya, who runs Compass Rose Editions, is a book packager, rights agent and translator who bought the rights for I Can Open It For You. She also has experience translating Yoshitake’s books. With this one, though, she decided she needed help working with all of the onomatopoeia, and connected with Lisa to do the translation.

I bought the Kindle version of this book ahead of time and kind of zapped through the onomatopoeia. When Lisa read for us, though, the effect was delightful and each word perfectly matched the item being opened. They were a combination of sound words—some you may have heard and some that Lisa made up for the occasion, like “fwipp” and “poomp,”and words that matched the situation, like “groan” “rip” and “sparkle.” This is definitely a book that lends itself to reading aloud.

Lisa told us how she researched the sound words for this project—by going around opening things. It sounded like fun, until I imagined myself opening up mountains of cans of sardines and bottles of corked champagne before I could figure out how to spell what they sounded like.  

In the second half of the book, though, Akira opens things that are enormous and spectacular, situations for which sounds can only be imagined. For these, Lisa chose short words that kept the reader’s attention on the unusual scenes, but also sounded great when read aloud. One she said she still wasn’t convinced had worked was “Ping!” for the sound of a boulder opening to reveal a fossil of a dinosaur skeleton. But looking at Akira using his magic star wand to do it, it seemed just about right to me.

Although not completely in the translator’s realm, the sound words were all drawn by hand—illustrations themselves, so the English sound words had to be drawn and then inserted into them. When the translator chose the word, she also needed to consider the space in the illustration available to it. You can see here that “Ping!” fits neatly between the two halves of the boulder.

Participants from all over the globe! It was exciting to add faces to names of translators we know from other countries!

This session with Lisa was helpful in terms of discussing translation technique for an issue that can be an ordeal for J to E translators, but I also came out of it with a number of good non-technical takeaways.

1. Connections are important. Lisa was connected to Rico Komanoya through a non-kid-lit channel. As translators we never know where our next job is coming from, but we should bear in mind that it will most likely come from someone we know, or a contact of someone we know who recommended us to them.
2. Lisa talked about how much time it took to translate I Can Open It For You compared to the amount of text that was involved. This made sense after hearing about the work she did to come up with the onomatopoeia!
3. Name the translator issues. Yoshitake’s books famously do not name their translators on the cover or even on the title page. You’ll find “Lisa Wilcut” in tiny print on the copyright page at the back of the book. We were, however, heartened to hear that, the Publisher’s Weekly notice (see below) included her name, and that libraries carrying the book are listing both the author and translator in their catalogs.

Lisa Wilcut is a writer, editor, and translator based in Yokohama. I Can Open It For You was her first picture book translation. She has been recognized by the Agency of Culture Affairs of the Government of Japan for her literary translation, and her creative fiction has appeared in Tokyo Weekender and the anthology Structures of Kyoto.

Quick Vibes from the “Big Feelings” Creative Lab

by Andrew Wong, Tokyo, Japan

SCBWI held a separate virtual edition of the SCBWI Winter Conference 2024 to offer people like me the chance to join live online across different time zones and access recordings of the event. Given a choice of three live online creative workshops, which are also available for later viewing, I plumped for The Big Feelings Picture Book Workshop led by Melissa Manlove. The 2-hour online workshop gave me the chance to bounce ideas and gain inspiration early on a Sunday morning with creators across the pond.

During the session, we worked through several exercises to delve into our past, into the feelings of our memories as a child, and talked about using them to tell stories that help children give shape to their futures. It developed into an exchange where we put our ideas and questions out in the chat and got live feedback without ever seeing each others faces or revealing our own.

Other than being emboldened by this faceless anonymity to put out responses in the chat (which I would have been done more readily and quickly if I were typing away on a keyboard rather than swiping it on my phone), my eyes took in the many brief text responses that communicated ideas and feelings succinctly. Words with deep, powerful nuances that evoked emotion were placed alongside ones that colored the imagination to create the setting. Not unlike some of the decisions wordsmiths sometimes make.

When considering how to make a story commercial came up, some of us thought about using animal characters for our stories, which is not uncommon in picture books to help make a story universal and speak more widely. While there was opinion that animal characters may better convey story elements, some of us also noted that some animals would work better over others.

The question of who reads picture books also came into the equation. Picture books are (generally) created for children but read for (to) them and purchased by adults. It made me think that the choice of animal over human protagonist could be made to remove some human aspects that are not essential to or could complicate the story, and might even sway any decision to pick up the book.

Like readers, translators do not get to see these decisions and the many alternatives that fall by the wayside. Since communicating with the author is not a luxury often available to a translator, creative workshops like this get me thinking about why some picture books can tug those heartstrings, and about the words and characters chosen to tell the story. I’d like to think that these allow me to delve deeper and feel closer to the story in its original language. And if I were to translate it, along with any research and background information, being able to feel closer to the story would be like having an emotional guide as I find a way to convey the story in another language.

Reflections on Self-publication with Kinota Braithwaite

By Andrew Wong, Tokyo, Japan

Self-publication is not normally considered a viable option for translators because acquiring the rights to a copyrighted text requires resources and legal expertise. But if you were the author, you could self-publish your work and get it translated as well. With a chance to dip into these rarely touched topics at SCBWI, I jumped in to join a crowd of about twenty, from as far as Chicago and Thailand, all curious to know what we could learn.

Kinota Braithwaite shares his journey in self-publishing with SCBWI

 

In an hour-long conversation, Japan RTC Susan Jones teased out the story behind why and how parent and teacher Kinota Braithwaite became a public speaker on racism and bullying. Most recently, he was on NHK’s Ohayo Nippon program in November (write-up in Japanese) and then again on NHK World-Japan shortly after the SCBWI event. Kinota wrote Mio The Beautiful, the first of three picture books, in response to his daughter’s experience of bullying at a Japanese public school. Although it was initially written as a means to heal the wounds in his daughter’s heart, Kinota soon realized he wanted more Japanese children to have access to it. He found a friend to translate it and scoured Instagram for an illustrator (who both declined to be named on the cover) to create the picture book in bilingual format, a decision made so that the story and its message would also be conveyed through the original text.

To the translator in me, a bilingual book first comes across as a lost opportunity (to translate), but looking at the bigger picture, being able to see the translation together with the story in the original language means they can be read by their intended (two) audiences, both at once. Bilingual books also give readers the chance to read the original text and understand how it is conveyed in translation, which also reveals the many decisions taken in creating the translation. This is a bonus and an invaluable resource.

Kinota then talked about how he ran crowdfunding campaigns to fund Kei The True Friend and Mio’s Wish after self-funding Mio The Beautiful. While I know of traditional publishing houses turning to Kickstarters for their publications, it was refreshing to hear Kinota speak candidly about how he made sure his campaigns were more likely to succeed.

Kinota’s three picture books, all self-published

 

Another takeaway from the session presented itself from a slightly different entry point. Having used Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) for self-publishing both in print and digitally for his picture books, Kinota mentioned how the on-demand service not only frees him from worrying about book sales and inventory, but also allows him to concentrate on creating an author platform to market his books and convey his voice and message. Translators are also creators, and it struck me then that I could do more to shape my own platform in a similar way.

Besides touching on things he learned through the course of self-publishing his books, such as hiring a professional designer to make sure the layout is appropriate for submission to the digital platform, Kinota also mentioned the need to keep writing and publishing books (a fourth book is in the works), not unlike creating your own portfolio as an illustrator, even before your work earns recognition. Despite it being an online event, I certainly felt the passion and energy behind Kinota’s efforts to fight racism and bullying, and his perseverance and sense of mission perhaps lay a lesson for translators and creators alike—keep creating and make sure our work remains visible!

Mulling The House of the Lost on the Cape with Avery Fischer Udagawa

By Deborah Iwabuchi, Maebashi, Japan

Avery Fischer Udagawa, translator of the 2022 Mildred L. Batchelder Award-winning Temple Alley Summer by Sachiko Kashiwaba, has translated a second book by the same author. The House of the Lost on the Cape (岬のマヨイガ) is set in the Tōhoku region during and right after the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami disaster. It was published by Restless Books in English in September 2023, but the original was serialized in the children’s section of a Tōhoku newspaper (Iwate Nippō) in 2014–15, before being published as a book by Kodansha in 2015.

Accolade and names on the cover

 

The story begins with an older woman about to check herself into a home for the elderly, a woman fleeing an abusive husband, and a little girl, recently orphaned and on her way to go live with an uncle she has never met. The earthquake and tsunami come as each member of the trio arrives in the town of Kitsunezaki, and they all end up at an evacuation shelter.

Deborah Iwabuchi: Avery, there are so many aspects of this book that I’d love to discuss with you. Since it was first published in the junior section of a Tōhoku newspaper in the 2010s, Kashiwaba obviously had young disaster survivors in mind. Although the story is full of magic and mythical creatures, it must also have resonated in the hearts of young readers due to the reality they had experienced. The three main characters are all female, but more importantly, they represent some of the most vulnerable segments of society. It turns out, though, that their heartbreaking experiences make them strong and resilient.

Avery Fischer Udagawa: You’re right, Deborah. I think this may be part of why the story moves people in many different contexts, though it was first written for youth in Iwate. Sachiko Kashiwaba grew up in Iwate, in the towns of Miyako-shi, Tōno, and Hanamaki—home to author Kenji Miyazawa—and has lived throughout her adult life in the prefectural capital of Morioka.

(Tōhoku has six prefectures: Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi, and Yamagata. Fukushima, Iwate, and Miyagi were hardest hit in March 2011, being located on the Pacific coast.)

Sachiko Kashiwaba and Avery Fischer Udagawa with the Jizō on Honchō Dōri avenue in Morioka, Iwate

Deborah: What I also found fascinating was that while in reality, so many people had to evacuate from locations in Iwate, the three main characters in the story ended up escaping to it—specifically to the fictional town of Kitsunezaki.

Avery: Indeed, their story shows how people can reach a place of feeling safe, even blessed, in a situation of hardship and grief. I think this is a helpful message for readers, both as validation if they have had a similar experience, and also as a source of hope if they are suffering.

Deborah: Three years after 2011, this story brought up the disaster in a way that validated young readers in what they probably remembered about what happened. Toward the end, a legendary snake conjures the forms of friends and family who moved away from Iwate right after the disaster. I thought that the characters’ attachment to these apparitions demonstrated how very natural it was to miss people. The main characters’ perseverance must also have allowed the initial readers of the story—people who had stayed put in Iwate—to be happy that they had stayed despite the crisis. This novel is an adventure for sure, but the author manages to comfort and empathize with her characters and her readers, as well as encourage them to believe in their own resourcefulness.

And it is a story for our times. There are so many natural and unnatural disasters these days. This book seems to offer a useful way to process things with children who are thrown off balance.

Avery: Indeed, in her review of the book, Hong Kong author Maureen Tai quoted these lines by US author Kate DiCamillo:

“So that’s the question, I guess, for you and for me and for all of us trying to do this sacred task of telling stories for the young: How do we tell the truth and make that truth bearable?”

Maureen wrote, and I agree, that Sachiko Kashiwaba tells the truth and makes it bearable in The House of the Lost on the Cape. This novel joins others from around the world that impart hope while also telling children the truth about tragedy, such as (to name just a few):

• The Raven’s Children by Yulia Yakovleva, translated from Russian by Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp, set in Stalinist Russia
• Dragonfly Eyes by Cao Wenxuan, translated from Chinese by Helen Wang, set during China’s Cultural Revolution
• Wild Poppies by Haya Saleh, translated from Arabic by Marcia Lynx Qualey, set during the Syrian War

I believe young people can all benefit from these portraits of hanging on when hope is in extremely short supply. And these stories serve the practical purpose of informing their readers. Even in Japan, elementary and middle schools are now full of children born since March 2011, who need to know what happened in Tōhoku.

Deborah: Getting down to the nuts and bolts, many people who have read your translation are impressed by the way you worked Japanese words into the English text. There were lots of names and nouns, and you dealt with onomatopoeia that’s so great in the Japanese language for its simplicity, but can be a real headache for J to E translators for whom that simplicity is elusive. How did you decide which words to leave in Japanese? Did you have a specific reader in mind?

Avery: I knew from the beginning that I was translating for children in the US, home of Yonder: Restless Books for Young Readers, which had commissioned the translation. Anime, manga, and translated literature have made American readers far more aware of Japanese culture than when (say) I was a child in Kansas, so I wanted to leave plenty of Japan-isms in the pages—mochi, futon, miso, kimono. At the same time, I wanted to keep readers oriented, so I inserted brief glosses where terms that were less widely known first appeared: river spirits after kappa, mats after tatami, porch after engawa. I received valuable input from the Restless editorial team when it came to deciding all of this. I appreciated their openness to transliterating Kashiwaba-san’s onomatopoeia for the sound of the tsunami slamming the base of a train platform in the opening chapter, as honestly, I had no words.

Deborah: Although it looks effortless on the page, I imagine there was more involved in actually developing the translation. Can you tell us about that? I know you are personally acquainted with Sachiko Kashiwaba. Did you work with her at all?

Avery: I definitely exchanged email with her while working on the translation. I also got to see her in Washington, D.C. to accept the Batchelder Award for Temple Alley Summer after I had completed the first draft of The House of the Lost on the Cape. And she and I presented in Hong Kong at the Hong Kong Young Readers Festival and International Literary Festival in March 2023, when Cape was in the final stages of the editorial process.

School visits with Sachiko Kashiwaba in Hong Kong! The @litfest_hk Young Readers Festival connected us with more than two hundred students. We talked about TEMPLE ALLEY SUMMER and introduced THE HOUSE OF THE LOST ON THE CAPE, due out in September 2023. #middlegrade #worldkidlit pic.twitter.com/UrSEUo1bgI

— Avery Udagawa (@AveryUdagawa) March 24, 2023

The experience of co-presenting helped me get to know Sachiko Kashiwaba better as a person, which surely fed development of the translation. For example, seeing the way she spoke to students in Hong Kong about the March 11 anniversary (which fell right when we were there), I realized that she clearly wished to inform people about it as well as to support survivors. That emboldened me to make the translation slightly more explanatory. For example, the opening words are あの日, literally “that day” as in “that day that’s seared in all our minds,” but after Hong Kong, I felt better making this “On March 11, 2011.”

Due to Japan’s long Covid-era border closures, I was not able to enter Japan while I translated The House of the Lost on the Cape—a situation that made me nervous at times. Many, many elements of it were specific to Iwate, especially to Morioka and Tōno. My family and I traveled there this past summer after the manuscript had been submitted, and I fretted that I might discover some key detail I had missed while translating about Iwate from afar. In Morioka, I caught myself mis-pronouncing the name of a street where an important Jizō statue is located, and back at our hotel, I whipped out my laptop to make sure I had named the street correctly in the manuscript. Fortunately, I had!

One step I am glad I took during the translation process was hiring Chikako Imoto, an eagle-eyed wordsmith with formidable cultural and research savvy, to do an accuracy pass. Her go-over focused not on the effectiveness of the English, but purely on whether I had caught every bit of the source text. Sometimes, I get so wrapped up in crafting the translation that I drop a line or miss a meaning that should be blindingly obvious, and Chikako saved me from myself. I also enlisted my husband and daughters and various other unsuspecting souls in my effort to make Cape as faithful and readable as possible—and the staff at Restless Books found many ways to polish and improve.

Deborah: Like Temple Alley Summer, The House of the Lost on the Cape has a story (or stories) within a story. The role of the folklore in this book is different as is the way it is communicated.

Avery: Right. While Temple Alley Summer has an embedded fantasy story whose authorship the characters investigate, and which appears in two long sections, The House of the Lost on the Cape features short interludes where the elder character Kiwa tells a folktale. Some of the folklore she shares is found in a real collection called the Tōno monogatari (Legends of Tōno); other material was created by Sachiko Kashiwaba in keeping with the spirit of the Tōno legends, which she has adapted in a volume for children. Another difference in The House of the Lost on the Cape is that creatures from folklore make appearances in the main story!

Visiting an L-shaped, thatched-roof house in Tōno

 

Deborah: I love the illustrations by Yukiko Saito (see View the Illustrations here). Did you get to see them as you did the translation? Even when reading the translation and even though I’ve lived in Japan most of my life, I found the illustrations helpful for confirming certain details. Not to mention the wonderful map of Kitsunezaki in the endpapers. I see the Japanese version had the same illustrator, were any illustrations added for the English version?

Avery: I worked from the 2015 Kodansha edition of the book, which had all of the same illustrations by Yukiko Saito. None were added for the Restless edition, all were kept, and some of my decisions about what to explain (or not) were based on information the illustrations provide. They especially help convey the atmosphere of traditional shrine dances, as well as the characteristics of various spirits and deities who defend the Kitsunezaki community. But I won’t spoil here their daring and dazzling deeds!

Deborah: Avery, thanks so much for this interview! As usual, talking with the translator reveals so much about a book and its author, along with the actual process of translation. I’d also like to note to readers here that Avery’s name is on the cover of The House of the Lost on the Cape. Naming the translator of a children’s book prominently is now a requirement for the Batchelder Award.

More Stories of Sato the Rabbit

By Andrew Wong, Tokyo, Japan

As we ease into the end of World Kidlit month, I caught up with Michael Blaskowsky (MB), translator of Yuki Ainoya’s 『うさぎのさとうくん』 series into the Sato the Rabbit series with Enchanted Lion Books, the first of which was listed among the Batchelder Honor books in 2022.

AW: The last time we did an interview, we were celebrating the publication of the first Sato the Rabbit book. How many books in the series have been translated into English so far?

The first three books in the series by Yuki Ainoya

MB: To date, three books have been published―Sato the Rabbit; Sato the Rabbit, The Moon; and Sato the Rabbit, The Sea of Tea. The success of the English translations spurred the publishing company to ask the author for a fourth book, which was published in Japanese in December 2022. Hopefully an English translation will be coming out soon.

AW: The fourth book came out of the English translation? Can you share with us how you heard about it?

MB: I don’t actually recall precisely, but I think the author posted something about this on the “うさぎのさとうくん” X (formerly Twitter) account (which you should follow, it’s really cute). She mentioned that in talking with her publisher, the interest for translated versions of this series showed them that there is interest in the series, and so they encouraged the author to create another book.

AW: I’ve heard of translations spurring new print runs of the original, but this is quite amazing! Do you know if your English translation has been used for translating into other languages?

MB: The English translation was not used for translation into other languages, but it did catch the eye of people in other cultures and acted as a catalyst for them to reach out and create translations in Spanish and Catalan. The series is also available in French, but those translations preceded the English versions.

(AW: I see El Conill Sato (tr. Natalia Asano and Marta Martí Mateu) and El Conejo Sato (tr. Natalia Asano), both published by Pastel De Luna, who seem to have done quite a few Japanese favorites by Toshio Iwai and Shinsuke Yoshitake.)

AW: Besides making the Batchelder honor list, were there any particular reviews or comments that were particularly satisfying? Have you met any of your readers?

MB: I don’t recall any comments that stand out in particular, but I did enjoy seeing so many people love the series for the same reasons that brought me to it. “Whimsical” came up a lot in reviews, which was great to see. I was very pleased to see readers focus on the art and story and what Ainoya-san was able to create.

AW: It really is hugely satisfying to hear about readers enjoying your work, particularly if it was the way you had hoped they would. Are there certain parts that were particularly challenging to translate?

MB: The onomatopoeia were quite difficult, and many times we opted to use a more descriptive verb in English instead of using a sound word. There were a couple places where the most accurate term in English was too technical and so we needed to find a workaround to make the text fit better with readers. For example, in one story Sato removes one piece of a raspberry (つぶつぶのひとつ), which is technically called a drupelet, but I had never heard that word before this series, so adding that word would have been too confusing for 4-8 year olds (and their parents, too). 

The fourth book Asahi

“Blue Skies” in Sea of Tea contained a particularly challenging onomatopoeia where Sato ties a fork to a kite and the fork stabs into the sky. The Japanese uses “さく” which is a commonly used sound for stabbing or inserting something. I wanted to find a word that would convey the softness of the sky being stabbed and even asked friends how they would describe a marshmallow being stabbed by a fork to source ideas, which gave me a lot of very creative ideas to work with.

AW: I think you created a new sound word in the process and a “drupelet” would have stumped me! Other than onomatopoeia, Japanese children’s picture books often have a fair amount of repetition and use tense in a particular way, so I’m curious about how you dealt with the tense and repetition, whether with instances of similar sentence structures or sounds, or other techniques used in the original Japanese?

MB: We chose to put everything in the present tense to make it feel like readers were exploring along with Sato, even though the Japanese did use past tense in several places. Ultimately, we felt that keeping everything in the present tense neatly complimented the discovery-aspect of the series and the idea that anything could change at any moment. The Japanese did use past tense every now and then to set up something that had happened during page transitions, but in our discussions, Claudia (Enchanted Lion) and I felt that maintaining a consistent tense was more important and more in line with English story conventions.

AW: This is a very interesting and important choice that helps to draw us into Sato’s world and join him in exploring and interacting with things as we read.

MB: For similar sentence structures and other techniques, I don’t recall much in the original that was too challenging, but English children’s books do have a longer history of rhyming, and so I tried to add alliteration for some playfulness, and I also opted for more fantastical or nice sounding words. I would write lists of synonyms for each word in a sentence and play around with combinations until I found a couple that I liked, then see how those worked with the sentences around them.

For example, page two of “Walnuts” in the first book describes how sometimes walnuts contain really special things. The text as lain out in the book is:

ときどき
とくべつ　すてきな　ものが
はいている
くるみが　あります。

So I wrote:

• Every so often a walnut has
• Now and then a walnut has
• Once in a while a walnut has
• Sometimes a walnut has

and

• something extraordinary and wonderful inside.
• something unique and magnificent inside.
• something extraordinary and magnificent inside.
• something unique and marvelous inside.
• something extraordinary and marvelous inside.

And then tried different iterations like this:

• Once in a while a walnut has something unique and wonderful inside.
• Once in a while he finds a walnut with something unique and wonderful inside.
• Every now and then a walnut has something unique and wonderful inside.
• Every now and then he finds a walnut that contains something unique and wonderful.
• Every now and then he finds a walnut with something unique and wonderful in it.
• Every now and then he finds a walnut with something unique and wonderful inside.

I settled on “Every now and then he finds a walnut with something unique and wonderful inside” for the first draft, which was later subjected to reviews and conversations with Claudia.

AW: You said before that the positions of the images were flipped for this spread, which I think made the English text and pictures work better together. Do you face any issues or challenges in the translation or publication process, whether with these books or with any projects you’re working on?

MB: The translation process itself was very fun and I really liked working with an editor. I was very lucky in that Enchanted Lion was precisely the right publishing house for this series and they were also the first people I reached out to, so the hardest part of the process was very smooth. For other series I’m interested in publishing, I’ve since tried this same process and just finding people to respond to book inquiries and trying to line everything up is probably the most time- and energy-consuming aspect, since there is no guarantee that a publishing house will respond and if they do, there is no guarantee that they will be interested. Since Sato the Rabbit, I’ve spoken with both US and Japanese publishers and both sides understandably prefer that the pieces are in place on the other side before committing too much (e.g. Japanese publishers want to have a US publisher lined up and US publishers that I’ve reached out to want to make sure that rights and everything are in place before going much further). Translation may require a lot of time and energy, but it is creative energy towards a finished product. 

AW: I think we know how difficult it can be to find a publisher, and how things can quickly develop when we make that connection! Can we look forward to your translation of Sato’s latest adventures in English?

MB: I hope so! Claudia is working on that side of things and so I don’t know much about what is going on with regards to that. I would like to add that I’m seeing more Japanese children’s books with English translations, which is fantastic! I’m always on the lookout for new books and many times in the last year I’ve found existing translations.

AW: It is really pleasing to hear that more children’s books from Japan are being translated into English! The Publisher’s Weekly translated titles web search is a resource you might turn to to find out whether a title has been translated for publication in the US. Good luck and we hope to hear more good news from you!

Catch Sato the Rabbit at Enchanted Lion or follow @hanerusato on X (formerly Twitter)!

Michael Blaskowsky’s translation website

*Japanese original titles are 『うさぎのさとうくん』(2006);『うさぎのさとうくん　つきよ』(2008); 『うさぎのさとうくん　こうちゃのうみ』(2014);『うさぎのさとうくん　あさひ』(2022) by Yuki Ainoya (相野谷 由起), Shogakukan.

 

SCBWI Japan Translation Days 2022 on Zoom

By Yui Kajita, Munich, Germany

The biennial SCBWI Japan Translation Day(s) returned for its seventh run in November 2022 with another exciting line-up. As with the last event in 2020, it took place over Zoom, allowing speakers and participants to gather from different countries all over the world, including Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Thailand, the UK, and the US. Always highly anticipated by both familiar faces and newcomers, this year’s program was once again full of useful information, inspiring anecdotes, and translation conundrums that everyone loves to mull over.

A Conversation with Editor Kathleen Merz, interviewed by Deborah Iwabuchi

Editorial Director Kathleen Merz

Kicking off Day One (November 12, 2022) was a live interview with Kathleen Merz, Editorial Director at Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, led by Deborah Iwabuchi. We heard about how Eerdmans came to focus on children’s books in translation: Garmann’s Summer (by Stian Hole, translated by Don Bartlett), which won the Batchelder Award, was an important starting point, and now at least half of the titles they publish each year are translations. Historically, they’ve found many European titles through the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, but they are eager to branch out to Latin American, Asian, and African publishers as well to expand the range of their list.

While Eerdmans originally specialized in theological textbooks (their history goes back to 1911), Kathleen is interested in a broad range of books, both fiction and non-fiction, picture books and middle grade. She loves to find books that are great conversation starters, introducing kids to things they might not be familiar with. For example, some favorites that she recently edited include a beautifully illustrated book about the Spanish Civil War, called Different (written by Mónica Montañés, illustrated by Eva Sánchez Gómez, translated by Lawrence Schimel) and a picture book introduction to paleontology, One Million Oysters on Top of the Mountain (written by Alex Nogués, illustrated by Miren Asiain Lora, translated by Lawrence Schimel), which is finding its way into school curricula. Kathleen values storytelling most of all, where different cultures, traditions, and so on are lived out as part of the narrative rather than shoehorned into the moral of the story.

It was interesting to hear about the part translators can play even in a book’s format: at Lawrence Schimel’s suggestion, Eerdmans took the text-dense picture book, Different, and transformed it into an illustrated middle-grade novel, which made it more accessible for the right US readership.

Though Kathleen often finds new translators through networks, she also shared useful tips on what she’d like to see in a pitch. Participating in this kind of SCBWI event is certainly another way for emerging translators to get their foot in the door.

Jocelyne Allen on Translating Colorful by Eto Mori, introduced by Holly Thompson

Translator Jocelyne Allen

After the “speed share” session, where the group got to hear from each participant about their current project, Jocelyne Allen gave a dynamic talk on how she came to translate the beloved classic Colorful (Counterpoint Press, 2021) by Eto Mori and the process of working closely with the editor, Yukiko Tominaga, to shape the voice of the novel.

Jocelyne was approached by Counterpoint Press to translate the book—she had been recommended to them by the foreign licensing team at Bungeishunju, whom she had known for years, and it also helped that the editor at Counterpoint had read Jocelyne’s translation of A Small Charred Face by Kazuki Sakuraba before. Jocelyne said it was a joy to work with Counterpoint, from the sample translation and grant application stage all the way to book production, as they truly respected her work as a translator.

Diving into the nitty-gritty details of the translation process of Eto Mori’s deceptively simple prose, Jocelyne offered so many juicy examples of what thoughts went into certain stylistic choices and how she dealt with particularly tricky issues, ranging from questions of tone and register to recurring keywords, and how to localize the text with minimal glossing. For example, she found a way to channel the character Hiroka’s childish, coquettish way of talking in English by using babyish words (like “horsey” for horse), peppering her dialogue with “like” and “so” (as in “so pretty”), and opting for more descriptive dialogue markers (“squeal” or “coo” instead of just “said”). She also shared how she arrived at a translation of the word 再挑戦 (rematch? re-try? do-over? second chance?) that would actually sound like a 14-year-old boy while also fulfilling its role as a keyword for the theme of the novel.

It was engrossing to hear how she brought the text to life in English, and how she worked together with her editor to make it happen.

You can find out more about Colorful and Jocelyne’s translation in this in-depth interview by Holly Thompson.

Presentation and Discussion of Japan Foundation Grant Funding by Aya Tamura from The Japan Foundation

Aya Tamura from The Japan Foundation

One funding scheme that supported both Jocelyne’s translation of Colorful and Avery Fischer Udagawa’s translation of Temple Alley Summer by Sachiko Kashiwaba was the Japan Foundation’s Support Program for Translation and Publication.

Aya Tamura, who works in the Arts and Culture Department’s Planning and Coordination / Literary Arts Section at the Japan Foundation, gave a thorough presentation on the Japan Foundation’s wide-ranging initiatives, especially the evolution and the reach of their translation support program. To date, they have supported the publication of nearly 1,500 books in 75 countries or regions, translated into 52 different languages. Excitingly for the kidlit community, they have recently launched Lifelong Favorites, a selection of children’s books that are or are expected to become classics that many children grow up with in Japan, which will be given priority in their support program selection. Though they had always been open to awarding grants for children’s literature, now, with this list, they hope to encourage more applications from children’s publishers.

While the grant application must be submitted by publishers, not individual translators, the Japan Foundation is enthusiastic about supporting the work of translators, and Aya invited ideas from the participants as well. The Japan Foundation’s recent projects include the Translator’s Roundtable Series (More than Worth Sharing, which garnered much attention from the translator community), the Translator Spotlight video interview series, and the Writing to Meet You series (an exchange of letters between authors). Her presentation offered information on other governmental support programs as well, including Japan Book Bank, an online catalogue of rights to Japanese content. Translators can look forward to more support initiatives from the Japan Foundation in the future!

Illustrator Naomi Kojima

We were also treated to an insider’s look at Naomi Kojima’s process of creating the banner and logo for Lifelong Favorites. She walked us through how she developed the illustration concept, starting from the idea of flying books, gradually evolving into the joy of welcoming and meeting a good book. Her brainstorming sketches were delightful to see.

A few examples of Naomi Kojima’s sketches for Lifelong Favorites

A Conversation with Editor Marilyn Brigham, interviewed by Andrew Wong

Senior Editor Marilyn Brigham

Day Two (November 19, 2022) began with an interview with Marilyn Brigham, led by Andrew Wong. Marilyn is Senior Editor at Two Lions and Amazon Crossing Kids, the two children’s book imprints at Amazon Publishing, and she shared how the imprints and she herself came to be involved in translated children’s books, the imprints’ commitment to regional diversity, and what they look for in kidlit in translation.

Observing the big push in recent years for diverse children’s literature as a way of getting fresh voices and perspectives, Marilyn is hopeful that an increasing openness to translations will continue in the future. Amazon Crossing’s list has a good mix of commercial and literary titles, and the books she has worked on have won both critical and popular acclaim, including multiple USBBY Outstanding International Book awards and a Goodreads Choice Award finalist for Best Picture Book. She is also eager to expand their middle-grade list, especially story-driven books with a commercial plot: she is currently working on a mythological fantasy story from Kazakhstan and a historical crime-mystery series from Sweden. Her enthusiasm was infectious as she introduced two brand new books, My GrandMom (by Gee-eun Lee, translated by Sophie Bowman) and Piece by Piece (by David Aguilar and Ferran Aguilar, translated by Lawrence Schimel).

She is always on the look-out for books, and there are many ways in which she meets new translators: through networks, recommendations from publishers, or books that come with the translator attached.

In her editorial choices, she prefers to retain the source culture as much as possible—sometimes adding a little glossary, or a publisher’s note, depending on the project—because she likes the books to have a sense of place. “Books can show all the ways we’re different, and all the ways we’re the same, and that’s the beauty of it.”

Takami Nieda on Translating The Color of the Sky is the Shape of the Heart by Chesil, introduced by Alec McAulay

Translator Takami Nieda

Takami Nieda gave a fascinating talk on her experience of translating The Color of the Sky is the Shape of the Heart (Soho Teen) by Chesil. We heard the surprising story of how this book came to be in the first place—Chesil was initially pursuing a career in acting, but she challenged herself to write a novel to mark the end of her twenties, and this very first book she wrote was shortlisted for the Akutagawa Prize. The protagonist, a zainichi teen straddling different cultures, is also a blossoming writer, and it is a story of how she reclaims or makes sense of her past and of herself through writing.

Because of her own background as an Asian American, the novel’s themes of “in-between-ness” resonated with Takami. As with Kazuki Kaneshiro’s Go, another book she translated, Chesil’s work struck her as the kind of story she wished she had had access to as she was growing up in the US. At the same time, it’s a “teachable story,” which she is always looking out for as a community college teacher.

Takami’s talk explored various questions, such as how much cultural bridging we should do in children’s books. She resists that idea and usually tries to do as little of it as possible, unless it’s absolutely essential for the story, so that readers can encounter stories that don’t center around their own culture or experience—after all, it’s only natural for readers to come across things they don’t understand.

Takami Nieda discusses translating a key phrase in The Color of the Sky is the Shape of the Heart.

There’s often talk about “what’s lost in translation,” but it was great to hear examples of what’s gained instead. For instance, the English novel could play up the theme of crossing cultural identities by varying the spelling of the protagonist’s name depending on where she was: Ginny Park in Oregon and Pak Jinhee in Japan. Also, since English can’t skip over pronouns as much as Japanese does, the star that Ginny has a conversation with was written with she/her, enhancing the sense of sisterhood between them. Chesil was very accommodating when discussing all these questions, as she came to the project with the understanding that a translation of her novel would be another being on its own.

You can read more about the book and Takami’s translation in this interview by Susan Jones.

After her talk, Takami valiantly led a translation workshop, critiquing the participants’ translations of an excerpt from Natsuki Koyata’s 『望むのは』, a book about difference and accepting difference—where your classmate’s mother can be a gorilla, and your friend can have a crush on an ostrich—which won the Sense of Gender Award in 2017. The group had a lot of fun picking apart questions of word-choice, sentence structures, condensation and embellishment, and so on, including how that slippery wasei-eigo イメージ (a katakana version of “image,” widely used for an impression, a look, how one perceives someone, how one visualizes an action or idea, etc.) can be handled as its meaning shifts throughout the passage.

You can read seven translations of the passage, including Takami’s, here.

Overall, Translation Days 2022 was a stimulating event, giving us renewed energy to carry on with our current projects and discover new ones. These inspiring conversations and a generous session on submission opportunities(for participants only), with practical tips on how to find leads and build connections, are sure to keep the fire going!

All credit goes to the lead organizer, Avery Fischer Udagawa, and the SCBWI Japan regional team, Mariko Nagai, Mari Boyle, Alec McAulay, and Naomi Kojima, for their enthusiasm for all things world kid lit and their dedication to putting together a wonderful program for the community.

One Passage, Seven Translations—Natsuki Koyata

By Avery Fischer Udagawa, Bangkok

On November 19, Day 2 of SCBWI Japan Translation Days 2022, Takami Nieda led participants in a translation workshop using a passage from 望むのは by Natsuki Koyata. This is a YA-appropriate novel that Nieda is translating as The Brief Colorful Year of Being Fifteen; her engaging synopsis and several pages of context for the workshop passage appear here.

Six translators submitted translations of the passage, which were then blinded and discussed in a session open to all participants. Below are the original passage by Koyata, the six submitted translations, and a sample translation by Takami Nieda. The two characters speaking are the teens Koharu (who speaks first) and Ayumu; Ayumu is a ballet dancer.

Original Passage

「それが何？　イメージと違ってがっかりって言いたいの？」口をついて出たその言葉は、しかし、その瞬間に小春の胸を貫いた。歩くんが都合のいい弱者でなかったことがどんなに自分を失望させたか、その失望がどんなに醜く、恥ずべきものだったか、小春はその痛みで初めて奥まで理解した。「あんたのイメージなんかどうだっていい」とそれでもなぜだか、自分自身を打ちのめしたくて言葉を継いだ。「これが現実のわたしだもん。あんたのイメージなんか、あんたのイメージする小春なんかぶっ殺してやる」

「殺せないよ。ぼくのイメージは本物だもん」たじろぎもせず、歩くんは返した。「ぼくのイメージはいつだって本物。いつだって現実だよ。脚はどの軌道を通るか、指先はどの高さまで達するか、イメージするからきれいに飛べる。イメージがすべてだ」そこで不意に、小春はぐらりと足元が揺らぐのを感じたが、「ぼくは白鳥だ。ぼくは王子だ」という屈強な宣言が、反対側から跳ね上げて小春を立たせた。「誰が気に入らなくたって、ぼくはイメージし続ける。そうして現実を作り続ける。つまらない幻想に、もうこれ以上振り回されたくないから」 

[Source: Nozomu no wa by Natsuki Koyata (Shinchosha, 2017)]

Translation A

“So, what? Disappointed I wasn’t like you thought?” Koharu spat.

Yet even as the words flew from her mouth, pain lanced across her chest. The hideous disappointment of Ayumu’s revelation, the sharp sting of shame, was like a physical blow.

“Who cares about what you think of me anyway,” she continued, inexplicably, somehow bent on making the situation worse. “This is who I really am. So whoever this imaginary version of Koharu is in your head, it’s time for her to die—bury her. She doesn’t exist.”

“You can’t just erase her,” Ayumu replied, unruffled. “What do you mean ‘not real’? My perception of you is a real thing—imagination is the beginning of reality. I can leap when I dance because I first imagine the arc of my legs, how my arms will extend. Perception is everything.” He paused.

“I become a regal swan. A prince.”

Koharu, who had begun to sag under the weight of his words, startled to attention at this sudden change of direction.

“If someone doesn’t like me,” he continued, “I continue with my image of myself anyway. This is how you create reality. I refuse to waste my time any more being boxed in by what is ‘normal.’”

Translation B

“So what are you getting at? Are you saying that you’re disappointed because I’m not who you thought I was?”

The words flew out of her mouth, but at the same time, they also pierced her heart. She had been disappointed when she realized that Ayumu wasn’t just some wishy-washy wimp, and this pain made her realize for the first time deep inside just how disgusting and disgraceful that disappointment was.

“I don’t care what your image of me is.”

But for some reason, she wanted to find words to continue bashing herself.

“This is the real me. Whatever image you have, I’ll destroy it – I’ll kill your Koharu.”

“You can’t. My images are real.”

Ayumu countered without hesitation.

“My images have always been real. The arc my feet will draw. The height my toes will reach. I can execute a jump well because I envision it. My images are everything.”

A sudden weakness in the legs caught Koharu off guard, but the defiant cries of “I am a swan. I am a prince.” bouncing up from the other side helped her stay on her feet.

“I’ll keep creating my images even if people don’t like it. This is how I create my reality. I’m tired of going around chasing some empty fantasy.”

Translation C

“What’s that supposed to mean? Are you saying you’re disappointed that I don’t live up to your image of me?” The words that came rushing out of Koharu’s mouth somehow stabbed her chest in the same moment. The pain caused her to perceive fully for the first time how ugly and shameful her own dismay had been, over Ayumu not being some weakling who could make her own life easier. “What do I care about your image of me?” she added, feeling that she wanted to clobber herself. “This is the real me,” she said. “Your image is nothing. I’ll murder the Koharu in your image!”

“You can’t murder her. My images are real,” Ayumu replied, not even flinching. “My images are always real. They become reality. I can jump because I visualize the arc my legs will trace, the height my fingertips will reach. The mental image is everything.

“I am a swan. I am a prince!”

Koharu felt her legs tremble as she listened to him, but his firm declaration from across the way brought her to her feet.

“No matter who hates it, I am going to keep visualizing,” he told her. “I am going to keep creating reality. I am sick of being tossed around by silly fantasies.”

Translation D

“What’s that all supposed to mean? I’m not like you imagined and now you’re disappointed?” Those were the words that spilled out, and the instant Koharu said them they pierced her soul. She suddenly understood how letdown she was that Ayumu wasn’t some weakling she could walk all over. On top of that she was crushed to realize how malicious that disappointment was—how shameful. And the pain of that shame took the revelation even deeper. “Well, I couldn’t care less how you think of me.” Now she felt like she was lashing out at herself, not Ayumu. “This is me. It’s who I am. I’ll murder that Koharu you think you know. The one in your head.”

“You can’t kill her. My images are the reality,” Ayumu came back without flinching. “Every image I’ve ever had is reality. I know which direction your legs will take you and how high your fingers can reach. You can fly because I’ve imagined it. My images of you are everything.” At that moment Koharu felt her knees buckle, until she heard Ayumu declare, “I’m a swan. I’m a prince!” and the words flew over from him to stand her back up. “It doesn’t matter what anyone thinks, I won’t stop creating images, or reality. I’m not going to let myself get sucked in to any more inane illusions.”

Translation E

“So what? Do you want to say that you are disappointed that the picture you had of me is wrong?” These words were pouring out of Koharu’s mouth but, at the same time, they penetrated her heart. For the first time, deep down, Koharu understood how disappointed it had made her that Ayumu is not a pitiful and weak person; how ugly and embarrassing this disappointment is, and the hurt. “I don’t care what picture you have of me,” and still, for some reason, carried on beating herself up. “Because this is the real me. I will kill your picture, the picture you have of me.”

“You can’t kill it. My picture is the real thing,” Ayumu argued without flinching. “My picture is always the real thing. Always reality you know. What trajectory my feet will take; what height my fingertips will reach; because I picture it, I will fly beautifully. Visualisation is everything.” At that point, Koharu suddenly felt her confidence waver. Ayumu made a strong statement, “I am a swan. I am a prince”, which made things clear to Koharu. “Even if someone doesn’t like it, I continue with the visualisation. That way I can create my own reality. Because I don’t want to be affected by a meaningless illusion anymore,” said Ayumu.

Translation F

“And so what? You’re disappointed ’cause I’m not the kinda girl you thought I was, is that it?”

The words flew out of her mouth before she knew it, but at the same time, it sliced through her own heart. As soon as it stung her, Koharu realized deep down just how much she’d been disappointed that Ayumu wasn’t the convenient underdog that she’d imagined him to be, and just how ugly that disappointment was, something to be ashamed of.

“I don’t care what you think of me,” she pressed on, somehow feeling the urge to keep beating herself up. “This is the real me. Who cares how you see me? That Koharu in your head? I’ll just kill her off.”

“You can’t kill her. How I see you is real,” Ayumu answered, without batting an eyelash. “How I see things is always real. It’s always reality. It’s because I visualize it in my head—the arc that my legs will trace, how high my fingertips will reach—it’s because I see all that, that I can do a clean leap.” Koharu’s legs suddenly felt wobbly, but what Ayumu said next, his iron declaration, made her shoot up straight.

“I’m a swan. I’m a prince.”

He went on, “No matter what anyone says, I’ll keep envisioning things. And that’s how I’ll create the reality. I’m tired of getting pushed around by useless illusions.”

Sample Translation by Takami Nieda

“What? You’re disappointed I wasn’t who you imagined, is that it?” she shot back.

As the words tumbled out of her mouth, something pricked her heart. It was the shameful sting of having assumed Ayumu was a pushover who needed protecting.

“Who cares what you think anyway?” She continued in spite of herself, “This is who I am, Ayumu. So that precious illusion of Koharu you have in your head has to die.”

“You can’t kill her. My perception is real,” he said, without batting an eye. “When I’m dancing, I just have to imagine the arc of my legs, the shape of my arms all the way down to my fingertips—that’s how I can land a perfect jump. It all starts with perception.”

Raising his arms, he continued, “I can be a swan. I can be a prince!”

Just as her legs wobbled beneath her, Koharu felt herself being propped up by his confident declaration.

“I don’t care what anyone thinks about me,” he said. “I’m going to keep on imagining and making my own reality. I’m tired of getting yanked around by people’s assumptions.”

Announcing SCBWI Japan Translation Days 2022

The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators presents

SCBWI Japan Translation Days 2022

Two days of online presentations, workshopping, and conversation for published and pre-published translators of Japanese children’s and young adult literature into English.

Dates: Saturday, November 12, 2022, and Saturday, November 19, 2022

Time: Meeting Room Opens 8:30 a.m. Sessions 9:00 a.m. – 1 p.m. JST

Place: Remote via Zoom

Fee: 3,500 yen for current SCBWI members; 5,000 yen for nonmembers. One fee covers both days. 

Translations of text for workshop with Takami Nieda due by November 5, 2022. Fee payments due by November 9, 2022.

Registration: To reserve your place and receive event details, send an email to japan (at) scbwi.org.

Recordings will be available to registered participants until the end of November 2022.

This event will be in English and Japanese. All dates and times are Japan Standard Time (JST). 

Schedule

Kathleen Merz

DAY 1: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 12

8:30 Meeting Room Opens

8:50 Opening Remarks

9:00-9:45 A Conversation with Editor Kathleen Merz

At Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, half (or more) of the titles published each year are translations. Editorial Director Kathleen Merz responds to questions in a live interview about what it takes to publish children’s books in English translation.

Jocelyne Allen

9:45-10:00 Break

10:00-10:15 Speed Share

Participants join a lightly structured “speed share” of their current projects.

10:15-11:00 Jocelyne Allen on Translating Colorful by Eto Mori

As the translator of Colorful by Eto Mori—a YA novel known in many languages and the basis of multiple films—Jocelyne Allen shares about the process and issues involved in bringing this iconic work to life in a US English-language edition.

11:00-11:15 Break

11:15-12:45 Presentation and Discussion of Japan Foundation Grant Funding

Aya Tamura

The Japan Foundation’s Support Programs for Translation and Publishing, and its recent Lifelong Favorites initiative, promise to increase the visibility and viability of publishing Japanese children’s literature in English translation. Avery Fischer Udagawa introduces the role Japan Foundation funding played in the publication of her translation of Temple Alley Summer by Sachiko Kashiwaba (11:15-11:30). Then, Aya Tamura of the Japan Foundation presents about its programs (11:30-12:15). Finally, participants in Translation Days have the opportunity to discuss how such support might connect to their projects (12:15-12:45).

12:45-1:00 Closing Remarks for Day 1

Marilyn Brigham

DAY 2: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 19 

8:30 Meeting Room Opens

8:50 Opening Remarks

9:00-9:45 A Conversation with Editor Marilyn Brigham

Amazon Crossing Kids is an imprint focused on global literature for children. Marilyn Brigham, senior editor of Two Lions and Amazon Crossing Kids, responds to questions in a live interview about what it takes to publish children’s books in English translation.

9:45-10:00 Break

10:00-10:15 Submission Opportunities

Participants learn about submission opportunities for those who join in this event, from interested publishers.

Takami Nieda

10:15-11:00 Takami Nieda on Translating The Color of the Sky is the Shape of the Heart by Chesil

As translator of The Color of the Sky is the Shape of the Heart by Chesil, Takami Nieda describes facilitating the English-language debut of a third-generation Korean born in Japan, whose writing raises key questions about identity and justice.

11:00-11:15 Break

11:15-12:45 Takami Nieda: Translation Workshop

Takami Nieda critiques participants’ translations of an excerpt from 『望むのは』, a title by Natsuki Koyata as yet unpublished in English.

Participants interested in receiving feedback during this workshop must submit their translations of the workshop text by November 5, 2022.

Names will be removed. Participants are not required to submit translations in order to join the workshop.

12:45-1:00 Closing Remarks for Day 2

Speakers

Jocelyne Allen (she/they) is a Japanese translator and interpreter, and has translated hundreds of short stories, novels, and manga, including the beloved Japanese classic Colorful by Eto Mori and the Eisner Award-winning Lovesickness by Junji Ito. As an interpreter, she has worked with Japan’s most celebrated authors and artists, including Sayaka Murata, Yoshihiro Tatsumi, Hideo Furukawa, and Akane Torikai. @brainvsbook 

Marilyn Brigham (she/her) is senior editor of Two Lions and Amazon Crossing Kids, the two children’s book imprints at Amazon Publishing. Her noteworthy titles include the upcoming picture book Ruby & Lonely by bestselling author Patrice Karst and illustrated by Kayla Harren; the It’s Not a Fairy Tale series by popular author Josh Funk, illustrated by Edwardian Taylor; and What If Everybody Said That? by Ellen Javernick, illustrated by Colleen Madden, the sequel to the Amazon bestseller What If Everybody Did That?. Prior to joining Amazon Publishing in 2012, Marilyn was at Marshall Cavendish, where she began as an intern and worked her way up to editor. There she edited books for kids of all ages, including popular title Goodnight, Little Monster by Helen Ketteman, illustrated by Bonnie Leick. Marilyn is the author of the board book Swim!, illustrated by Eric Velasquez, and the educational title Dik-Dik (Even Weirder and Cuter Series). When not editing or writing, Marilyn can be found at the beach.

Kathleen Merz (she/her) is the Editorial Director at Eerdmans Books for Young Readers. She has worked on a number of award-winning titles, including books that have won the Caldecott Honor, the Batchelder Award for translation, the Sibert Medal, and other honors. She studied English and linguistics, and especially enjoys working on translated books and nonfiction picture books. She is always looking for original picture books, narrative nonfiction, and middle grade stories—particularly books that tackle contemporary social issues and celebrate diversity or multiculturalism, and stories that have well-crafted voice and strong characters. Kathleen lives in Michigan, and when she’s not at work editing she can usually be found outdoors biking or kayaking.

Takami Nieda (she/her) was born in New York City and has degrees in English from Stanford University and Georgetown University. She has translated and edited more than twenty works of fiction and nonfiction from Japanese into English and has received numerous grants in support of her translations, including the PEN/Heim Translation Fund for the translation of Kazuki Kaneshiro’s GO, which went on to earn a Freeman Book Award for Young Adult/High School Literature from the National Consortium for Teaching about Asia. Her translations have also appeared in Words Without Borders, Asymptote, and PEN America. Formerly an assistant professor of translation at Sophia University in Tokyo, she currently teaches writing and literature at Seattle Central College in Washington State, US. @TNieda

Aya Tamura (she/her) joined the Japan Foundation in 2003. After working in the General Affairs Department and at the Japan Cultural Institute in Paris (Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris), she joined the Arts and Culture Department’s Planning and Coordination / Literary Arts Section in 2021. Support Programs for Translation and Publishing 

Avery Fischer Udagawa (she/her) serves as Translator Coordinator and Japan Translator Coordinator in the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Her translations include the Mildred L. Batchelder Award-winning novel Temple Alley Summer by Sachiko Kashiwaba, illustrated by Miho Satake, published by Restless Books. @AveryUdagawa

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A Translator’s-Eye View of the SCBWI Japan 2022 YA/MG Novel Revision Workshop

By Andrew Wong, Tokyo

Back in May, as the winds brought a change in season, I recalled that SCBWI Japan was holding a MG/YA novel revision workshop over the summer. The initial call for participants was put out in March and included translators. With dates for submission, feedback, and wrap-up provided, participants were given the flexibility to work around their summer schedules. After dwelling on whether to take the plunge right up until late May, I finally did so, with a translation of a book that is a fun family favorite. Having worked on either picture books or excerpts before, a novel was a first for me.

Pushing myself through a full novel from scratch, I experienced among other things the arduous process of keeping the style of the narrative and the voices of the characters consistent—and the enormous discipline required to complete a draft within a set time frame (on spec and after checking the rights, of course!). By the time I had finished translating and thoroughly re-enjoying the story, I was worried that it might read as though I had put the original under a microscope. Unsure whether my rendering would convey the story as well as the original had, clicking that Send button was more frightening than it was liberating at the time.

Holly Thompson kindly shared her revision process with participants

The next part of the workshop was much more relaxing: reading! Assigned to a four-member critique group, I got to read other works in progress, and was reminded to provide, other than synopses, feedback on the positives in each manuscript because “writers in the drafting process get bruised easily!” We were also asked to raise questions to consider when revising.

I was glad when the synopses and feedback from my critique group assured me that my novel translation had gone down well. While there were compliments on the strength of the story and its vivid visualizations, I also received suggestions about parts that left hints of the Japanese original. Recognizing that positive feedback on the story was largely down to the hard work that had already gone into the published title, I was grateful to hear more ideas in the wrap-up session on how to think about shaping the work for English readers, and about how the characters sounded. Having people read our work is one thing, meeting them (even virtually) to actually talk about it is another! To round off the workshop, we shared our plans for revising our manuscripts.

Joining this workshop gave me a new perspective on decisions made in weaving storylines, shaping narrative arcs, and building characters. As creators and storytellers, while aspects of writing and translating naturally overlap, telling the same story well in another language brings about different challenges, some of which I’m sure will be visited by translation-focused events like Translation Days 2022 (just round the corner!).

For a writer’s view of the workshop, check out Alec MacAulay’s post on the SCBWI Japan Blog!

Wendy Uchimura on the New Edition of The Great Shu Ra Ra Boom

By Avery Fischer Udagawa, Bangkok

The Great Shu Ra Ra Boom by Manabu Makime, translated by Wendy Uchimura, is a humorous YA novel that is also action-packed, suspenseful, thought-provoking, and full of tantalizing food. Set in the vicinity of a large and ancient lake northeast of Kyoto, it features two families with mysterious powers somehow connected to the lake, which have propelled them to prominent social status but also obliged them to deal with a generations-old conflict. The novel’s main character, a 15-year-old boy in one of the families, who comes to stay with his lordly cousin the same age—on the grounds of the clan’s main branch, essentially a castle—struggles to comprehend this situation while fitting in at a new school. I got to ask the translator, Wendy Uchimura, about her experience translating The Great Shu Ra Ra Boom, which came out for the Sony Reader in 2014 but got reborn in Kindle format in 2022.

Wendy Uchimura

Avery: Hi Wendy! What led to The Great Shu Ra Ra Boom getting launched in the Kindle format? Do I understand correctly that you got to do another editing pass to refresh it?

Wendy: It’s been on the cards for a long time from what I can tell. It’s just there are a lot of excellent books getting relaunched from the Shueisha English Edition series, so it had to wait its turn! And I did get to look at it again. It was strange delving into the story once more after eight or so years and quite daunting – I’m one of these translators who once I’m completely satisfied with how I’ve translated a work, I’ll release it into the world and let it make its own way. There will undoubtedly be a few flaws, but at least I can say I did my best.

So, I was nervous going back in, but it was like meeting an old friend that had just improved with time. Looking at it with more experienced translator and editor eyes gave me a new appreciation for what a great story it is.

Avery: If I’m not mistaken, all the lineages and powers and myths that come up in this book are made-up—but am I off there? Does Japan have real-life myths to do with Lake People who turned into powerful clans? Has the water at Lake Biwa been considered divine, and/or the lake associated with a dragon??

Wendy: Makime is amazing at building realistic worlds that are steeped in history, culture, and fantasy. It means that as you’re reading you can imagine these things happening as they’re not that far removed from reality and yet they go a step beyond. More than once while I was translating, I found myself checking the maps and topography of the area around Lake Biwa because I thought I could pinpoint exactly where the Hinode Castle was. Maybe I did! It made me realise too that there is a huge amount of mythology tied to water in Japan. It has the power to purify, provide life, and give rise to legends.

I didn’t know before translating this book that lakes have lifespans. Most of the lakes we know now are less than 18,000 years old. Lake Biwa is estimated at being more than four million years old! That’s a lot of history and you can’t help feeling that something that ancient must have mystical powers. It’s a fact that its shores have been inhabited since around 9,000 BCE and a great number of shrines dot the area. Who knows what type of people gathered there and what they did.

The island located on Lake Biwa and featured in the story is Chikubushima and there have been several water goddesses enshrined there. Originally the main deity was Azaihime-no-Mikoto, who protected wayfarers across the lake and later on, from the Heian Period, Benzaiten took her place, who is both a Buddhist and a Shinto deity, as well as being both a goddess of water and of knowledge. Although more associated with the island of Enoshima, legend says that Benzaiten married a dragon king with her residing atop the island and the dragon below. As the story unfolds, you can see how these myths are drawn on and flow into a more modern setting.

Readers might be excited to know you can go to that island and see the clay cups that play a small yet important role, as well as write a wish on them and throw them down into the waters of the lake, just like Ryosuke and Patter-ko did.

 

Avery: I relish how the book serves up humor alongside its drama. The Hinodes’ menu selections alone make for endless comic relief, from the abalone packed for lunch (and mistaken as a mushroom) to the French toast served (and stolen) in the Castle dining room near the climax.

Wendy: The mentions of food are wonderful, aren’t they? This again is an example of how Makime balances that line between fantasy and reality. There are almost urban myth-like stories in Japan of children appearing at school with their lunchboxes stuffed full of lobster and other delicacies, either by parents wanting to establish some kind of status for their child or just very overenthusiastic and doting grandparents. But here this comic effect is very much in matching with Tanjuro and building up the impression that he is indeed a lord. I love the contrast between his huge lunches and Hiromi’s paltry rice balls. The scenes in the castle dining room just get more and more extravagant too, especially the serving of noodles!

Avery: Under the surface, this novel touches on a range of social issues from shut-ins (via Kiyoko’s character) to environmental pollution (the litter in the lakebed) to the effects of social stratification (the Castle versus its depressed rural area; the Hinode ancestor’s entitled and tragic intervention in Old Gen’s life). Did you feel as you worked with the novel that it managed to bring up these difficult-to-approach issues precisely because of the author’s deft use of humor and drama? Were there ever moments when it was challenging to reconcile the gravity of the issues raised with the book’s rollicking comedy and excitement?

Wendy: I didn’t find any particular difficulty with the issues introduced and I think that is because the nature of the story and the humor carries across the messages without bordering on lecturing. I felt where it involved the characters, like Kiyoko’s social withdrawal and the treatment of Old Gen, there was sympathy and understanding for their situations. There’s a subtle use of the town as a representation of the separation between the different social levels and both the landscape and characters reflect the natural changes in thinking that occur across generations. The environmental issues are well addressed too and make us think. Water is a precious resource and needs respecting. Going back to my earlier point about the lifespan of lakes, it’s actually a scary thought that some lakes only exist for 1,000 years or even less, 100. That such bodies of water can be lost even within our lifetime should make us respect them all the more.

Avery: What is one scene or section that you felt particularly pleased about translating, and could you please walk us through why it stands out for you, and what challenges you faced when putting it into English?

Wendy: I have a constant reminder in my living room of exactly what scene stands out for me – a Carrom board. Just like Ryosuke, I had never even heard of Carrom until the scene where Kiyoko suggests playing it to take their minds off their impending fate. The scene has the four main young characters sitting around this mystery board with the game pieces being called specific names and moved across the board with particular hand movements. There are instructions available in English, but of course if you’re not familiar with a game, it’s really difficult to explain it using the correct terms and actions. I could really feel Ryosuke’s confusion because I was feeling it too! So I actually imported a Carrom board. It’s mentioned in the story, but it really is true that although Carrom used to be played across Japan, particularly among the upper classes of society, it is now confined to a small area of Shiga prefecture, so it wasn’t like I could just go to a toy shop or local Carrom club to look at one. My board isn’t lacquered or red though!

Wendy even has a dragon as her business logo.

Avery: I understand that your own family has some shared name-characters, like those that come up in the book. Would you be interested in talking about what your family’s shared characters are and what role they play?

Wendy: Yes. The characters in the book use shared kanji characters and elements related to water in their names within their families to signify certain meanings. It’s interesting how names can be used to convey connections. It does make it an extra challenge when translating, especially in this case where it’s an integral part of the story, but it’s also fun.

And in a strange coincidence, as you mention, my immediate family members have a shared kanji too – the character for dragon! Not me, of course, but my husband and two sons all have dragon in their names, so I like to think of myself as a dragon tamer!

Avery: Who would you most like to hand this book to in the English-reading world, and why?

Wendy: I think anyone who wants a glimpse into Japanese life and culture would enjoy this. It has something for everyone – fantasy, history, humor, cuisine, social issues, school life. It kind of covers all the bases for what you’d come across spending some time in Japan. OK, maybe not the bright red uniforms, horse-riding through the town, or something coming up out of the lake at you, but you never know!

And as always when talking about this book, I’d like to finish by giving a shout out to Keiichiro Ito, the designer of the cover for the English version, because where would a book be without its cover.