Nurith Aviv's latest film celebrates language

January 19, 2011 Nurith Aviv (1945, Tel Aviv) has just released Traduire (To Translate) a French/Israeli documentary, the last film of her trilogy, preceded by D’une langue à l’autre (From language to language) and Langue sacrée langue parlée (Sacred language, spoken language).

Traduire is a Babel-like film in which translators from different countries express in their own language the experiences they have had as translators of Hebrew literature through the centuries, from the Midrach, to medieval Hebrew poetry and contemporary literature. Translators speak with passion about the confrontation with another language which often leads them to defy the rules of their own mother tongue.

In Barcelona, Manuel Forcano, Catalan translator of the poet Yehuda Amichaï (1924–2000) recognises the influence this reformer of Israeli literature has had on his  own poetry. In Acre, Ala Hlelel, Palestinian translator of dramatist Hanoch Levin (1943–1999) into Arabic explains how he has to  “let the ‘father tongue’ die” in order to draw the concision of the Hebrew language into the efflorescence of classical Arabic.

For more information see the original article (in French) here.