Month: April 2022

Why I’m reading Dragonwatch by Brandon Mull

The five-book young-adult fantasy Dragonwatch series by Brandon Mull was finished and released as a box set in November 2021. It’s a continuation of the five-book Fablehaven series.

I read Brandon Mull’s Five Kingdoms series in 2018 after the books were all published and the box set was released. I read The Candy Shop War and its sequel in April 2015. I read the three-book Beyonders series in a more spread out kind of way (May 2011, October 2012, Jan 2014). Same with the Fablehaven series: I started reading the it in July 2008 and finished the fifth book in August 2010.

Why have I been looking forward to reading these? Why is it that I’ve read so many of Brandon Mull’s books? What’s so great about them, anyway? Well, I’ll tell you.

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How not to learn Chinese in Singapore

I have been trying to learn Mandarin since before I moved to Singapore in 2008. I have made embarrassingly little progress.

That’s starting to change.

At a cost of SG $245, I have registered for HSK Level 3 and HSKK Beginner in mid-June 2022. The HSK is the Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi, the standardized test for Mandarin Chinese. HSKK is a separate speaking test.

When I take the test, I will have been studying Chinese either for twenty years, or two months, depending on how you count. I’m good at languages, but this is going to be tough. I am taking stock of the resources available to me and trying to decide what to do and how. This process includes reflecting on all the things I’ve done before.

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What’s the best translation of Madame Bovary?

The original Eleanor Marx-Aveling translation is still widely read, if the number of revised editions and reprints available are anything to go by. The relatively recent Lydia Davis translation from 2010 is also widely read, if the amount of media attention is anything to go by.

No one seems to have much to say about the Bantam translation by Lowell Bair or the Signet translation by Mildred Marmur; concerning the Oxford edition translated by Margaret Mauldon, I could only find negative comments. Lesser known brands Hackett and Alma published translations by Raymond N. MacKenzie and Christoper Moncrieff in 2009 and 2010, respectively.

Editions that seem to have or have had a larger number adherents are the 1957 translation by Francis Steegmuller, the 1992 translation by Geoffrey Wall, and the 2011 translation by Adam Thorpe.

To see for yourself what these translations sound like and what people have said about them, visit We Love Translations: World Literature in English, where you will also find cover images, ISBNs, pagecounts for hardcovers, paperbacks, and ebooks from different publishers.

» What’s the best translation of Madame Bovary?

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