What Language Do I Dream In?: A Memoir
Autor Elena Lappinen Limba Engleză Hardback – 14 mar 2017
Taking its title from a question often asked of polyglots, What Language Do I Dream In? is Elena Lappin's stunning memoir about how language runs throughout memory and family history to form identity. Lappin’s life could be described as “five languages in search of an author”, and as a multiple émigré, her decision to write in English was the result of many wanderings. Russian, Czech, German, Hebrew, and finally, English: each language is a link to a different piece of Lappin’s rich family mosaic and the struggle to find a voice in a language not one’s own.
From Europe to North America—and back again, via some of the twentieth century’s most significant political upheavals—Lappin reconstructs the stories and secrets of her parents and grandparents with the tenderness of a novelist and the eye of a documentary filmmaker. The story of Lappin’s identity is unexpectedly complicated by the discovery, in middle age, that her biological father was an American living in Russia. This revelation makes her question the very bedrock of her knowledge of her birth, and adds a surprising twist: suddenly, English may be more than the accidental “home in exile”—it is a language she may have been close to from the very beginning.
“English is not my mother tongue,” writes Elena Lappin, “it is something more valuable: a language I was lucky enough to be able to choose.” What Language Do I Dream In? is a wonderful, honest story about love, family, memory, and how they intertwine to form who we are.
From Europe to North America—and back again, via some of the twentieth century’s most significant political upheavals—Lappin reconstructs the stories and secrets of her parents and grandparents with the tenderness of a novelist and the eye of a documentary filmmaker. The story of Lappin’s identity is unexpectedly complicated by the discovery, in middle age, that her biological father was an American living in Russia. This revelation makes her question the very bedrock of her knowledge of her birth, and adds a surprising twist: suddenly, English may be more than the accidental “home in exile”—it is a language she may have been close to from the very beginning.
“English is not my mother tongue,” writes Elena Lappin, “it is something more valuable: a language I was lucky enough to be able to choose.” What Language Do I Dream In? is a wonderful, honest story about love, family, memory, and how they intertwine to form who we are.
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Specificații
ISBN-13: 9781619029118
ISBN-10: 1619029111
Pagini: 310
Dimensiuni: 152 x 229 mm
Greutate: 0.56 kg
Editura: Counterpoint
Colecția Counterpoint
ISBN-10: 1619029111
Pagini: 310
Dimensiuni: 152 x 229 mm
Greutate: 0.56 kg
Editura: Counterpoint
Colecția Counterpoint
Recenzii
“Elena Lappin can absorb new languages like a sponge absorbing water: a useful gift, since a life begun in Russia soon swept her from country to country, and she could live comfortably in each of them. But in which could she go that one step further, and find her true self as the writer she knew herself to be? This book is her story of her search for that special language. It is a captivating book, so sparkly with vitality, humour and genuine charm that English readers have to love it—and feel lucky. Because the language Lappin finally homed in on is theirs!”
–Diana Athill, author of After a Funeral, and Somewhere Towards the End
"This intriguing memoir throws a unique light on the fortunes of a young woman - her travels, her cultural inheritance and, most of all, her languages. Elena Lappin's tale is an archetype of post-war political upheaval, her travels and migrations a reflection of world events. But it is also an extraordinarily personal account of a modern life that is uniquely Jewish...the tree roots of [Lappin's] memory remembered from childhood and captured here in her remarkable memoir."—The Jewish Chronicle
–Diana Athill, author of After a Funeral, and Somewhere Towards the End
"This intriguing memoir throws a unique light on the fortunes of a young woman - her travels, her cultural inheritance and, most of all, her languages. Elena Lappin's tale is an archetype of post-war political upheaval, her travels and migrations a reflection of world events. But it is also an extraordinarily personal account of a modern life that is uniquely Jewish...the tree roots of [Lappin's] memory remembered from childhood and captured here in her remarkable memoir."—The Jewish Chronicle
Notă biografică
Elena Lappin is a writer and editor. Born in Moscow, she grew up in Prague and Hamburg, and has lived in Israel, Canada, the United States and — longer than anywhere else — in London. She is the author of Foreign Brides and The Nose, and has contributed to numerous publications, including Granta, Prospect, the Guardian, and The New York Times Book Review. She is the editor of ONE, an imprint of Pushkin Press.