Thinking Through Translation

Punctuated by thoughtful wit, this engaging volume of essays offers Jeffrey M. Green’s personal and theoretical ruminations on the profession of translation. Green begins many of the essays by relating the specific techniques and problems associated with translating from Hebrew texts. From this intimate perspective, he forges wise reflections on such subjects as identifying and preserving the writer’s voice, the cultural significance of translations and their contents, the research and travel that are part of a translator’s everyday life, and the frequent puzzles associated with the craft.

Green combines a contemporary frankness about the financial, practical, theoretical, and ethical aspects of translation with an aspiration to write “like a good literary critic of the old school”—considering the moral and spiritual implications of the translation as well as its content. Thinking Through Translation shows us, with eloquent honesty, that translation is a delicate art and skill, and presents the trade as a way of attaining insight about history, the world, and oneself.

Jeffrey M. Green is a professional writer and translator who lives and works in Jerusalem. He has translated numerous scholarly and fiction books and stories, including the story Pisces by Nobel Prize-winning author S.Y. Agnon and several works by noted Israeli author Aharon Appelfeld. He was the ghostwriter of Trudi Birger’s Holocaust memoir A Daughter’s Gift of Love.