I was so looking forward to seeing her, this intriguing Lori Saint-Martin. I had arrived early at the Éditions du Boréal stand in order to be able to talk to him before the crowd rushed. I was the first.
Lori died suddenly that night in Paris, where she was attending a writers’ convention. She was 63 years old and leaves an indelible mark on the Quebec literary landscape.
Lori was simple, modest. She signed her book to me who i think i am “For André, another of those beings who live between languages. »
Lori published a novel in 2013, closed doors, but it is above all his work as an essayist that commands attention. In this regard, his latest opus, A necessary goodlifts the veil on the little-known world of literary translation, too often assimilated to a distortion of the original text.
Nay! proclaims the author. And she is right. “We often see translation as a necessary evil,” she says. We are wrong. It is a necessary good like water, like air. She shows that literary translation is miracle, beauty, plenitude.
A key work for anyone who appreciates foreign literature.
who i think i am surprise even more. Lori Saint-Martin’s personal journey is unique: an English speaker born in Kitchener, she decided at a very young age to break not only with her environment, this uninspiring provincial town, but also with her English-speaking culture. She decided at the age of ten to become French-speaking and set to work.
His book is much more than a personal story, it is a hymn to learning other languages, to this unspeakable happiness of becoming someone else when you speak French and Spanish instead of English. .
This happiness breaks down all the obstacles of French: the lists of verbs to learn, spelling, grammar… The book is sprinkled with remarkable, profound reflections on language learning.
Quebec has just lost one of its brilliant feathers.