Jagannath

AFTERWORD Transposing Worlds

The decision to translate my own work was born out of an old dream. When I first got serious about writing, I fantasized about becoming so well-known in Sweden that someone would translate my work into other languages. I put the thought out of my mind—I wasn’t even published in Swedish yet—and ten years passed.

My country has a long and solid tradition when it comes to short stories and speculative fiction, but it proved difficult to publish either. Among the handful of Swedish magazines that published short stories, few were interested in the fantastic, and those that were died off one by one. Abroad, on the other hand, Weird Tales beckoned. And Interzone, Asimov’s, Strange Horizons. Scores of magazines, just out of reach.

I was by no means sure my English was good enough. I pretended it was, figured I’d need some immersive practice, and applied to the Clarion SF & Fantasy Writers’ Workshop on a lark. I got in, and ever since I’ve been writing stories in both Swedish and English, creating translations in both languages.

My experience of English reflects that of most Swedes of my generation. I studied British English from the fourth grade, learning through songs by The Beatles and the rituals of tea time. American English was the language of MTV and the movies, and, later, science fiction paperbacks. Being so exposed to both varieties, neither of which is your own, makes it difficult if not impossible to keep track of what word (and often, pronunciation) belongs where. You make do with the resulting composite. This collection may reflect that wonderful confluence and confusion.

Writing in Swedish and English are two very different experiences. Your native language resonates in your bones. Each spoken word reaffirms or changes the world as you see it, intellectually and emotionally. Because Swedish is my mother tongue, I can take enormous liberties with it because I know exactly and instinctively how it works. English doesn’t quite allow itself to be grabbed by the scruff of its neck in the same way. As a result, I’m more careful with the prose, perhaps less adventurous, because without that gut reaction it’s hard to know exactly how something will resonate with an English-speaking reader. On the other, I may find paths into English that a native speaker might not, because there are aspects of your native tongue that you just don’t see since you are standing in the middle of it. I am reminded of those times I’ve been amazed by how a non-native speaker can bend my own language in unexpected directions, or just approach it with an ear that makes it seem like a new creation.

Concepts and stories definitely work in different ways depending on language. For example, “Jagannath” and “Aunts” taste different, partly because of the sound of words associated with the stories. They are both concerned with anatomy, and the English terms I found appropriate were often softer and less abrupt. The word flesh, for example, can be drawn out and rolls around in the mouth; the Swedish analogue kött (sounds similar to the English shut) is hard and brutal in comparison, and also means “meat,” which is not the feel I wanted. The same goes for intestine versus tarm, blubber versus späck and so on, with the exception of slemhinna which sounds far better than mucous membrane.

Some concepts and cultural overtones refuse translation, but that’s the case with any language. If I say something has a “dansband” atmosphere, a Swede will immediately know what I’m talking about and probably cringe. Few people outside Scandinavia will be familiar with the sickly sweet faux-country music played by men in identical frilly pastel suits, and the claustrophobic image of small-town monoculture that comes with it (whether that culture actually exists is uncertain, but the cliché certainly does). So in these stories I’ve left in some words that could technically be translated but would completely lose their meaning. On the other hand, some small details have to be translated—even if some nuance is lost—because they aren’t vital to the story and would just trip up the reader. In “Rebecka,” there’s a group of kids dressed in ski overalls that in Swedish would have been bävernylon: beaver nylon, a fabric so strong that you could be dragged behind a car without getting a scratch. The image of kids in beaver nylon overalls is a sort of shorthand for innocent childhood and everyday Sweden. Figuring out which of these concepts require translation and which do not has been a great exercise for understanding my own language. Cultural shorthand is convenient but can also make you a little sloppy, so being forced to think about what a throwaway phrase really means jolts you out of writing on autopilot.

It’s inevitable, I suppose, that I’ve been told that my stories in English have a distinctly Nordic feel. It’s not something I set out to achieve, but there are concepts that I do like to examine and play with and that I suppose are very Swedish—or Nordic, really. National identity is an artificial exercise, and the borders between the Nordic countries blur. But accepting the notion for a moment: “Some Letters for Ove Lindström” deals with being a child of the prog generation: the intellectual left of the 70’s for whom the personal was political, who idealized a working class they didn’t belong to, and who founded the image of the soft Swedish dad. The ultra-stereotypical rituals of “Aunt Brita’s Holiday Village” is another: the Midsummer feast, dansband, the summer dress-and-knitted cardigan outfits of chilly Swedish summer. Both stories, I suppose, are about cultural identity.

This quality also comes through in the atmosphere of the stories. One sensation peculiar to the Nordic culture of my upbringing is that we really do live on the edge of fairy country. With a small population that’s mostly gathered in towns, vast stretches of countryside could contain any number of critters. Many folktales, and other stories I grew up with, such as the ones by Finno-Swedish author Tove Jansson, show reality as a thin veneer behind which strange creatures move. I learned to be aware of things lurking in dark corners, of the huldra that looks human from the front but is a rotten tree at the back; of the hattifatteners gathering on hills to feed on thunderstorms. Weird fiction, when I discovered it, fit right into this worldview. Maybe a bit too much so, at the beginning: I was fifteen years old when I devoured all of H.P. Lovecraft’s translated works in two weeks and had a short but near-psychotic revelation that all of it was true. I recovered, but reality still has a bit of a wobble.

And then there’s the melancholy. The beloved Swedish word svårmod translates into“hardship mood,” which translates into a sort of despairing acceptance of the facts of one’s existence (a popular Bible quote for wall hangings is a paraphrase of Matthew 6.24: “Do not worry about tomorrow. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”). But it also translates as what a friend of mine called “smiling through tears.” It defies concrete description, but it shines through in much of our culture, a moody Bergman sibling in the back seat of the Volvo, sighing at the sunset.

I have tried to convey all of these things, and more. Hopefully some of them made it across to you.