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From: Nina Lindsay <linds_na>
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 10:40:45 -0800 (PST)
Apologies to those who's names look wrong here--my email doesn't support diacritics. Alarcon should have an accent on the "o", Castaneda a tilde on the "n"]
I worked for two years recently at a library branch in Oakland where a near majority of the dense population is Latino. (Mostly Mexican immigrant families, but with a wide variety of families from Central and South American countries as well.) While I'm able to read and speak a little Spanish, I'm not fluent, and so a difficultly I run up against regularly is evaluating translations.
One reason I appreciate Francisco X. Alarcon's poetry picture books (from Children's Book Press) is because he has written both the English and the Spanish versions that appear side by side. (In fact, when I asked him about it, he said that some of the poems came first in English and some in Spanish). Not only can I trust his own translation, but the poems are lyrical in both languages, and make for great reading aloud.
There are two authors --sadly, both recently passed-- whose books I turn to regularly for older readers. Omar Casteneda's two novels "Among the Volcanoes" and "Imaginging Isabel" are about a young girl growing up in a village in contemporary Guatemala. Lyll Becerra de Jenkins's several novels (including "The Honorable Prison" and "Celebrating the Hero") feature young adults in contemporary Colombia. Interestingly, both authors were from the countries they wrote about, but wrote these books in English and published them in the United States. Unfortunately, I fear the books are for the most part out of print; but they are excellent YA novels for any audience.
Finally, a plug for a local author and press. Pinata Books [tilde on the
"n" please] recently published a bilingual retelling of The Three Pigs by Bobbi Salinas that's absolutely hilarious, and good for older readers
(the humor is along the lines of "The Stinky Cheese Man"). One of the nice touches are some of the asides of Nacho, Miguel, and Tito (the three pigs), who make jokes in English or Spanish, alternatetly. If you're reading the English or the Spanish version of the story, the jokes are different, because if they were translated directly, they wouldn't be funny. Bobbi Salinas also published, through Pinata Books, a long-time standby for teachers and librarians: "Indo-Hispanic Folk Art Traditions" which comes in two bilingual volumes. These are full of cultural background, illustrations, recipes and crafts for Navidad(Christmas)/Dia del los Reyes(Epiphany)/etc. (Volume 1); and for Dia de los Muertos
(Volume 2). Volume 1 has the instructions for papel picado that has been the main standby until Carmen Lomas Garza's excellent "Making Magic Windows" offered us a wider selection.
Nina Lindsay, Children's Librarian Oakland Public Library, CA linds_na at oaklandlibrary.org
Received on Fri 10 Mar 2000 12:40:45 PM CST
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 10:40:45 -0800 (PST)
Apologies to those who's names look wrong here--my email doesn't support diacritics. Alarcon should have an accent on the "o", Castaneda a tilde on the "n"]
I worked for two years recently at a library branch in Oakland where a near majority of the dense population is Latino. (Mostly Mexican immigrant families, but with a wide variety of families from Central and South American countries as well.) While I'm able to read and speak a little Spanish, I'm not fluent, and so a difficultly I run up against regularly is evaluating translations.
One reason I appreciate Francisco X. Alarcon's poetry picture books (from Children's Book Press) is because he has written both the English and the Spanish versions that appear side by side. (In fact, when I asked him about it, he said that some of the poems came first in English and some in Spanish). Not only can I trust his own translation, but the poems are lyrical in both languages, and make for great reading aloud.
There are two authors --sadly, both recently passed-- whose books I turn to regularly for older readers. Omar Casteneda's two novels "Among the Volcanoes" and "Imaginging Isabel" are about a young girl growing up in a village in contemporary Guatemala. Lyll Becerra de Jenkins's several novels (including "The Honorable Prison" and "Celebrating the Hero") feature young adults in contemporary Colombia. Interestingly, both authors were from the countries they wrote about, but wrote these books in English and published them in the United States. Unfortunately, I fear the books are for the most part out of print; but they are excellent YA novels for any audience.
Finally, a plug for a local author and press. Pinata Books [tilde on the
"n" please] recently published a bilingual retelling of The Three Pigs by Bobbi Salinas that's absolutely hilarious, and good for older readers
(the humor is along the lines of "The Stinky Cheese Man"). One of the nice touches are some of the asides of Nacho, Miguel, and Tito (the three pigs), who make jokes in English or Spanish, alternatetly. If you're reading the English or the Spanish version of the story, the jokes are different, because if they were translated directly, they wouldn't be funny. Bobbi Salinas also published, through Pinata Books, a long-time standby for teachers and librarians: "Indo-Hispanic Folk Art Traditions" which comes in two bilingual volumes. These are full of cultural background, illustrations, recipes and crafts for Navidad(Christmas)/Dia del los Reyes(Epiphany)/etc. (Volume 1); and for Dia de los Muertos
(Volume 2). Volume 1 has the instructions for papel picado that has been the main standby until Carmen Lomas Garza's excellent "Making Magic Windows" offered us a wider selection.
Nina Lindsay, Children's Librarian Oakland Public Library, CA linds_na at oaklandlibrary.org
Received on Fri 10 Mar 2000 12:40:45 PM CST
