[with Eda Özbakay]
Susanna Basso was born in Turin, where she works primarily as a translator for Einaudi. Over the years, she has won numerous awards and accolades: the Procida Prize (in 2002 for her translation of Atonement by Ian McEwan and in 2014 for Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro), the Mondello Prize (2006 for Every Day Is Mother’s Day by Hilary Mantel), and the Nini Agosti Castellani Prize (in 2007 for her translation of Jane Austen). Among the authors she has translated are Ian McEwan, Alice Munro, Kazuo Ishiguro, Julian Barnes, Elizabeth Strout, Martin Amis, and Jane Austen. In 2010, she published the essay On Translation: Experiences and Militant Musings (Bruno Mondadori).
When did you become a translator? What was your professional journey?
n the early 1980s, Barbara Lanati was my mentor at university. She organized what she called a "clandestine" translation seminar at the University of Turin, which turned out to be a pivotal experience for me and some of my colleagues. During that seminar, almost as a game—thanks to our mentor’s boldness—we translated poems by Amy Lowell, an early 20th-century American poet. We had an incredible amount of fun; it was our first experience with translation, and we were amazed to be working on poetry. At the end of the seminar, Barbara Lanati spoke about our work to the publisher Einaudi, who decided to publish the book. That’s how it all began, in the most improbable way—starting with poetry and Einaudi, as university students, is the opposite of what usually happens. But it sparked in us an immense enthusiasm for this kind of work, a sort of opening, a belief in us from a teacher like Barbara Lanati.
Of course, in the years that followed, to gain experience, I also translated texts of a very different literary caliber. Then, in 1988—after eight years of apprenticeship—I had another stroke of luck: a translation test organized by Einaudi because the new novel by Ian McEwan was, at the time, without a translator. I took part in this test for The Child in Time, and that’s where it all started for me. It was the beginning of an incredibly fortunate collaboration with Einaudi and some fantastic authors.
The curious thing is that I, along with my colleagues, started from the bottom—that is, from what one usually reaches at the end of a career. It was an exhilarating experience because engaging with the language and poetic voice of Amy Lowell was an absolute privilege that allowed us to approach this profession in an extreme way. Poetry confronts you with the impossible. Being part of a group meant measuring ourselves against each other, negotiating, admiring someone who had a brilliant idea, and coming up with new ideas based on what we heard. It was truly an exciting experience.
In reality, though, the practice of translation confronts you with the solitude of the translator. In the work that follows over the years, apart from the wonderful encounters with colleagues, it’s just you and your text.
I believe this is, ultimately, the greatest gift that translation offers, despite all the anxieties it produces and the feelings of inadequacy: discovering the multiplicity of a text, starting from the realization that reading itself is multiple. Translation is a losing game that recovers itself in multiplicity, pointing to the possibility that someone else might find something different, or that you yourself might, years later or even the next day. It doesn’t matter how you get there, but it’s never truly finished. Dissatisfaction is certain and constant, but it always points to another possibility.
I think that, even for the translator, over time, a multiplicity of choices opens up, including in the interpretation of what they’ve written before. I don’t enjoy rereading my old translations—not because I disown them, but because, as in Borges’ story, encountering the stranger we were many years ago is a bit embarrassing. Perhaps even discovering that we were, at times, much bolder or even more brilliant. I recognize in my younger self an audacity with texts that I no longer have. Everything seems more hesitant now. I hope I’ve gained something in terms of awareness, but when I reread my past translations, I feel like I am that person—though not entirely.
