Weizman: What are the particular challenges of trans-
lating Levin’s work?Cohen: For me, this is the first time I’ve ever translated
theater, and I’m finding that the emphases are different
from translating fiction. One of the problems that comes
to mind is that of names. Levin’s names are unique, often
full of double meanings to a Hebrew speaker, so we had
to think about how they would sound to English speak-
ers—how to keep, where possible, a hint of those double
meanings. The sounds are like Pupchik and Kupchik,
which just aren’t meaningful in English.Fallenberg: They still sound funny.Weizman: But they’re also more difficult to pronounce.
Those sounds don’t roll off an English-speaking tongue
in the same way.Fallenberg: I just learned from a Polish translator that
the name Dupa actually means “stupid head” in Polish,
and then I started worrying, what did we miss? But
then I realized that most Israeli audiences wouldn’t have
known that either, and luckily, Dupa sounds funny.
Another challenge that occurs to me is Levin’s ridicu-
lous little rhymes. We had to decide what we would
retain. For example, in The Thin Soldier, there is a little
song, and we wanted to keep the rhyme scheme and
meter, but it also tells a story, about a mother fly and her
“flychick.” We had to retain the story because it has reso-
nance for the play itself. But those sorts of challenges,
where we would look at it and say, “We’ll leave this for
later,” were rare. I find that his plays are characterized
by language that is both high and low. The language can
be at one moment biblical and rich and then the next
ridiculous, absurd, and scatological, so we get to these
situations where in the middle of this high dialogue we
would have to say, wait—is this balls and prick? There’s
a whole passage about nipples, an ode to the nipple. So
the challenge is how to work that in.Cohen: I actually come across that sort of thing a lot
in Hebrew. It’s extreme with Levin, but contemporary
Hebrew literature swings between high and low reg-
isters, between biblical and colloquial, all the time. In
Grossman I had that, and in many other writers.Weizman: Levin’s characters are firmly rooted in East-
ern European Jewish social culture. To what extent did
you attempt to preserve that aspect? How did you man-
age to convey that culture to people who don’t know it?Fallenberg: These are plays, and so the challenge is
very different from narrative. All we have to work with
is what the actors say to one another. There’s much less
leeway. One time we were trying to choose one of five
possible English words for something in Hebrew. As
we often do, we were arguing it this way and that, and
suddenly I said, “I think this verb also has a political
nuance, and maybe that’s what he meant in the Hebrew,”
and Jessica agreed with me. But that’s as far afield as we
can go. Our choices are prescribed by the words these
people say to one another. There may be more leeway in
the stage directions, but that’s less significant.Cohen: It’s the same challenge as getting across any
aspect of Israeli culture to someone who doesn’t know it.Q&A JESSICA COHEN & EVAN FALLENBERGThe language can be at one
moment biblical and rich
and then the next ridiculous,
absurd, and scatological.
Jessica Cohen was
born in England, raised
in Israel, and lives in
Denver. She translates
contemporary Israeli
prose, poetry, and
other creative work.
She shared the
2017 Man Booker
International Prize
with David Grossman
for her translation of
A Horse Walks into
a Bar. She is a past
board member of the
American Literary
Translators Association
and has served as a
judge for the National
Translation Award.
left Israeli playwright Hanoch Levin. Photo © Gadi Dagon44 W LT SUMMER 2019