Speaking in Tongues

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Summary

This is a book about languages, what languages can and what they cannot do.

In this dialogue between a Nobel Laureate and a leading translator, provocative ideas emerge about the evolution of language and the challenge of translation.

Language, historically speaking, has always been slippery. Two dictionaries provide two different maps of the universe: which one is true, or are both false? Speaking in Tongues - taking the form of a dialogue between Nobel-Laureate novelist J. M. Coetzee and eminent translator Mariana Dimópulos - explores questions that have constantly plagued writers and translators, now more than ever. Among them:

How can a translator liberate meanings imprisoned in the language of a text?
Why is the masculine form dominant in gendered languages while the feminine is treated as a deviation?
How should we counter the spread of monolingualism?
Should a translator censor racist or misogynistic language?
Does mathematics tell the truth about everything?

In the tradition of Walter Benjamin’s seminal essay 'The Task of the Translator', Speaking in Tongues emerges as an engaging and accessible work of philosophy, shining a light on some of the most important linguistic and philological issues of our time.

Reviews

Anything J.M. Coetzee writes deserves our full attention
Evening Standard, on The Death of Jesus

About the authors

J M Coetzee

J.M. Coetzee’s work includes Waiting for the Barbarians, Life & Times of Michael K, Boyhood, Youth, Disgrace, Summertime, The Childhood of Jesus and, most recently, The Schooldays of Jesus. He was the first author to win the Booker Prize twice and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2003.

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Mariana Dimópulos

Mariana Dimópulos is an Argentine writer, translator, and teacher. Specializing in German philosophy and the work of Walter Benjamin, she has published four novels. The last of these, Quemar El Cielo (2019), was a finalist on the shortlist of the Fundación Medifé-Filba Novel Prize in the year of its publication. She teaches at the University of Buenos Aires.