– paulo da costa     Sunday morning in my neighbourhood. Cars pull into parking lots and doors slam shut. This domino of bangs echoes a timeless, proverbial Big Bang of life-changing events. The amiable people exchange smiles and jovial greetings as they stroll with purpose to their varied gatherings of devotion. In high-ceilinged buildings they will soon congregate and listen to stories of creation, parables of morality, illustrations on righteous conduct. They will sing hymns of worship and pray recurrent supplications for health, wealth and peace. On the radio, after having rescued the greedy, bankrupt bankers and the automobile barons, another politician extols the value of the goods economy…

  – AN ARCHITECTURE OF MULTICULTURAL IDENTITY –   Homens que são como lugares mal situados Homens que são como casas saqueadas […] Homens encarcerados abrindo-se com facas Homens que são como danos irreparáveis Homens que são sobreviventes vivos Homens que são como sítios desviados Do lugar   Daniel Faria   My first memories, first smells and sounds are of Angola, coloured by its African geography of heat and flavoured by its culture, spirituality and music. My experience of the continent was brief, since a handful of years later my parents returned to their homeland in Portugal, where I was raised in the northern grape-growing hills of Beira Litoral. Backpack…

  (…) excerpts   2. resuscitation Word and story can function as an emergency resuscitation for our numbed selves, quagmired in hopelessness and exhaustion, buried in overworking conditions. This rubbing of words generates sparks to illuminate the atrophied mind after a diet of cultural inanity and stale laugh tracks. A fresh story may articulate a need so utterly fundamental to human longing, so deeply repressed and silent that it will resurrect the flame of desire for a different living experience. This fundamental capacity of awakening the human spirit and resurrecting the citizen by naming, remembering, connecting and informing, giving voice to that which was silenced and lies moribund, has always…

  A new phenomenon of combative books adorned with spikes rather than spines, armours rather than covers, vying for centre stage and the gold medal of attention at the annual CBC Canada Reads marketing blitz, has become the prominent public spectacle of our Canadian literary scene. The essential design of this radio show—yes show, not program—borrows the militaristic “shock and awe” tactic to reveal the one and only winner by applying the psychological counterpart of the gory attrition of Roman gladiators or ice hockey goons to drum up the attention of listeners. The authors themselves are not required to step onto this cerebral bloodthirsty rink to be pitted against each…

  Portraits of Queen Elizabeth the Second in full regalia lined the walls. The oil paintings spanned the mood of her reign. Sixty prospective citizens stood, left hands raised, their free hands clutching Korans, Bibles, Books of Mormon. I clutched a pine cone in my vest pocket. “I swear I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Queen of England, Her Heirs and Successors, according to law and that I will faithfully observe the laws of Canada and fulfil my duties as a Canadian citizen.” Soon-to-be citizens, and eager relatives, repeated in unison, line by line, the required oath while I practised the…

  Each particular text requires that the translator be attuned to its needs. The needs are varied and complex in any transposition from one language, one culture to another. Here I will focus on the exploration of a text’s specific musical needs. From the poetic to the technical, and to varying degrees, each text will require assorted scales of attention to facilitate the flow of language. To accomplish this a translator must be an attentive listener and, in addition, competent at hearing the music in the words. What does the text shout, and what does the text murmur? Will the range of notes touch all ears across all cultures? Translation…