The mysteries of language

Editor’s Note: We feature the brilliant recommendations of our partner, the Champaca Bookstore, in the Read section twice a month. FYI: Champaca is an independent women-run and founded bookstore and children's library in Bangalore. 

How does language shape our understanding of ourselves? Of our world? Of each other? This wonderful reading list inspires you to contemplate the profound mysteries of how humans communicate. All the books listed here can be found in Champaca Bookstore or online on www.champaca.in.

Written by: Nirica Srinivasan is a writer and illustrator. 

Over to Nirica…

The author Ken Liu once wrote, “Every act of communication is a miracle of translation.” Our interactions with other people, or even with the world around us, are being communicated and translated by our brains in real time. It’s no wonder we sometimes struggle to put our experiences into words, or find ourselves unmoored in situations where we can’t understand the language spoken by those around us. We bring you a collection of books that explore the many complexities of language—the way it shapes our world, its constant evolution, and these many acts of communication and translation.

‘Translating Myself And Others’ by Jhumpa Lahiri, partly translated from Italian by the author. After years of living and working in Italian, Jhumpa Lahiri collects her thoughts on translation in this collection of essays. This is an expansive, thoughtful book, full of personal reflections and anecdotes as well as rigorous research about translation as a practice, and the Italian language. This is an examination of Lahiri’s decision to write almost entirely in Italian for the last few years, the latest result of which is her luminous new short story collection, ‘Roman Stories’. 

‘Intimacies’ by Katie Kitamura. A young interpreter at the International Criminal Court spends her days translating the trials of politicals, presidents, and generals, accused of war crimes and genocide. Her work involves making herself invisible, in order to most closely communicate the words in the true spirit of how they are spoken. ‘Intimacies’ is a taut, propulsive novel about how language and communication have the capacity to be both intimate and isolating, both comforting and violent. 

‘Swimmer Among the Stars’ by Kanishk Tharoor. The stories in this collection by Kanishk Tharoor loosely explore the idea of “home” in different ways. The highlight of the collection is the title story, an interview with the (fictional) last speaker of a language. She speaks in her almost-lost language, which the ethnographers can only understand as if “reading shapes in a raincloud”. This story is a beautiful reflection on translation, as she strings beautiful phrases together that no one will ever understand. 

‘Greek Lessons’ by Han Kang, translated from Korean by Deborah Smith and Emily Yae Won. Han Kang’s latest novel to be translated into English is a haunting story of two people brought together by loss—a man losing his sight, and a woman who finds herself unable to speak. This is a novel that expands the idea of communication beyond just the words we speak to each other, and one that really probes the limits of language.

‘Project Hail Mary’ by Andy Weir. In Andy Weir’s book, language gets a bit more alien. Astronaut Ryland Grace finds himself alone on a spaceship with almost no possibility of survival… until he makes a strange new friend. Grace and the alien must work against the clock to save themselves, and maybe find their way back home. This is a really fun read, as we watch Grace devise a system of communication between the two of them, in order to be able to fix their spaceships and work together. 

‘Because Internet’ by Gretchen McCulloch. Do you feel like the way people talk on the internet makes no sense? Linguist McCulloch takes this question seriously, charting the rules and grammar systems of internet lingo—everything from memes to punctuation marks to emojis. This is a fascinating read about the way languages constantly evolve, how people on the outside of a language system can misunderstand it, and all the many ways in which tone and intent are conveyed online.

‘Interior Decoration: Poems by 54 Women from 10 Languages’, edited by Ammu Joseph, Vasanth Kannabiran, and Ritu Menon, and translated by various translators. This collection by Women Unlimited collects poetry in translation from across time and geography in India, including languages like Urdu, Marathi, Kannada, Bangla, and Tamil. It explores the possibilities—and the limitations—of women’s self-expression in regional languages, while also bringing up thought-provoking questions about movements between languages. This is a glimpse into a varied world of women’s poetry, as well as the many textures of languages in translation. 

‘Footpath Flowers’ by JonArno Lawson. Sometimes communication doesn’t need a single word. This beautiful wordless book is a children’s book, but really, it’s for all readers, big or small. This moving story is conveyed through illustration style and colour, and it is more complex than an initial reading may make it seem! 

Life at Champaca

Join Champaca for a workshop on Painting with Botanical Inks by Sudha Palepu. There’s a book launch of 'Like Being Alive Twice' authored by Dharini Bhaskar who will be in conversation with Jahnavi Barua. 

If you’re in Bangalore, we invite you to come to our lush, leafy store, attend the events and browse through our shelves with cold tender coconut water/ a hot cup of coffee, as per the whims and fancies of the ever-changing Bangalore weather!

And as always, you can find us, our book recommendations, and keep up with our upcoming events, on our website, Instagram, and Twitter!