Along with her novels, Vlady Kociancich worked connected a translation of Joseph Conrad’s The End of the Tether, which according to her obituary by Daniel Gigena successful La Nación, “había sido muy elogiada” (was highly praised). This translation is contiguous successful The Eighth Wonder, explicitly fixed that the narrator is moving connected a translation of this book, arsenic good arsenic successful much hidden forms.
Alberto Paradella, the lawyer-turned-writer-turned-translator-turned-journalist-turned-scriptwriter astatine 1 constituent refers to the travel betwixt the Spanish and English versions of the substance helium is moving connected arsenic a “double itinerary”; the metaphor of the travel arsenic a bidirectional translation, wherever the precise process of moving alters the elements successful movement, carries done the publication successful galore ways. In the novel, Paradella cannot look to decorativeness the translation, owed to distractions, heartbreaks, travels, and misplacements of the manuscript. In “real life,” Kociancich did decorativeness the translation, which she worked connected astatine the aforesaid clip arsenic she wrote The Eighth Wonder, and which was published arsenic Con la soga al cuello by Emecé successful an variation with a noose connected the cover, aboriginal reprinted successful an variation by Hyspamérica unneurotic with Sergio Pitol’s translation of El corazón de las tinieblas (Heart of Darkness) and a prologue by Jorge Luis Borges.
There are aggregate Spanish translations of The End of the Tether—En las últimas, Situación límite, El cabo de la cuerda—but Kociancich’s rubric Con la soga al cuello, which tin beryllium much virtually translated arsenic With the Rope Around the Neck, is my favorite. It somewhat shifts Conrad’s title, conscionable arsenic Borges’ rubric Otra vuelta de tuerca (Another Turn of the Screw) gave a further swivel to the novella by Henry James.
Which makes maine think: possibly Paradella did decorativeness his translation. The entirety of The Eighth Wonder could beryllium work arsenic Kociancich’s translation of Conrad’s The End of the Tether taken to its extreme, wherever the translator has entered truthful profoundly into the publication that what she translates are not conscionable words, phrases, and ideas, but scenes and atmospheres, truthful that the publication journeys from the assemblage satellite of Singapore to the modern satellite of Buenos Aires. This is thing antithetic from “rewriting,” The dizzying movements successful The End of the Tether crossed onshore and sea, from the English boardinghouse to the Malaysian coastline, with stops astatine impermanent ports and the lone location one’s boat, are mirrored successful the Argentine question journalist’s movements from Villa del Parque to the Berlin metropolis, passing done airports with lone books and dreams arsenic one’s home. Transition and question go the lone constant, until it becomes intolerable to instrumentality oregon adjacent find home.
There is disquiet successful the absorption that translation requires, the mode the aforesaid enters different satellite astatine the imaginable disbursal of the existent one.
An endless journey, a travel 1 cannot escape, which mightiness beryllium a synonym for nightmare. Or arsenic Conrad puts it: “Captain Whalley, important and dignified, near well-nigh unsocial successful the immense edifice by each light-hearted skurry, felt much and much similar a stranded tourer with nary purpose successful view, similar a forlorn traveler without a home.” From Conrad’s The End of the Tether to Kociancich’s La soga al cuello to Kociancich’s La octava maravilla to this translation The Eighth Wonder—this excessively has been a journey, 1 of galore possible.
In an interrogation with Silvina Friera for Página/12, Kociancich said:
Quería incorporar la thought de que todos vivimos traduciendo la realidad, traduciendo a las otras personas, aunque nunca vas a conocer a alguien enteramente. Traduje una de las más hermosas novelas de Joseph Conrad, La soga al cuello, hice toda esa experiencia porque nary estaba escribiendo ficción. Al traducir a Conrad, a quien venero, maine di cuenta de que tenía que conseguir el tono de la prosa de Conrad. Lo que maine quedó fue la experiencia de que realmente estaba traduciendo, dando una versión, porque, lo mismo en la vida, hay sentimientos que lad intraducibles.
(I wanted to incorporated the thought that each of america unrecorded translating reality, translating different people, adjacent if it’s ne'er imaginable to cognize idiosyncratic completely. I translated 1 of the astir beauteous novels by Joseph Conrad, The End of the Tether, I went done that full acquisition due to the fact that I wasn’t penning fiction. While translating Conrad, whom I venerate, I realized that I had to execute the code of Conrad’s prose. What stays with maine from that acquisition is that I was translating successful the afloat sense, giving my ain version, due to the fact that conscionable arsenic successful life, determination are sentiments that are untranslatable.)
The Eighth Wonder is some things [cinema and journey], due to the fact that the cinema is simply a journey, and the travel is the substance of cinema. The 2 inhabit clip and space, but extracurricular of the infinitesimal successful which they exist, they person nary world astatine all.
–Vlady Kociancich, The Eighth Wonder
Whalley could successful a fractional hr of solitude unrecorded again each his beingness with its romance, its idyl, and its sorrow.
–Joseph Conrad, The End of the Tether
The Great Pyramid of Giza, the Colossus of Rhodes, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Mausoleum astatine Halicarnassus, the Statue of Zeus astatine Olympia, the Temple of Artemis astatine Ephesus: these were Herodotus’ 7 past wonders. The eighth wonder, successful this novel, is simultaneously the travel and the cinema. Both are all-absorbing; some are forms of question that alteration one’s mind. The seventh creation of the cinema, and the 7 wonders of the world: these are possibly similar the seventh enactment successful a philharmonic scale, the constituent of maximum hostility earlier the eighth begins a caller scale.
I deliberation of the Spanish operation “me paso la película” (I spot it arsenic if it were a film), which evokes the infinitesimal that 1 sees everything flash done one’s mind, arsenic if it already happened. There is simply a pleasance successful this capableness for fantasy, for viewing everything astatine once. Something similar the complement to the bardo aft death, but projected into the future, wherever 1 observes what is to travel and develops the effect of the contiguous into a satisfying communicative arc, with each its happiness oregon tragedy, its “risas y penas” (laughs and griefs), arsenic the salsa vocalist Héctor Lavoe enactment it. The operation cradles this paradox; depending connected the context, the operation could mean bliss oregon tragedy. “Me paso la película” could beryllium utilized successful astir immoderate context, from the romanticist (say, a phantasy astir a idiosyncratic 1 desires) to the terrifying (say, fearfulness of an accident). The capableness to envision bears everything.
Here we tin determination to an existent film. The little 1978 documentary Borges para millones begins with the process itself of shooting, attentive to its ain creation. Then it abruptly cuts to Borges, seated successful a chair, with waxen-looking tegument and carved features, successful Technicolor. He speaks fast, similar an automaton, without pauses, arsenic if he’d spoken the aforesaid lines a cardinal times before, opining that emblematic Argentines are from everywhere, “fácilmente cosmopolitos” (easily cosmopolitan), and should frankincense work each the books, unrecorded each the experiences, “no negarnos a nada” (deny ourselves nothing). He is presently learning Icelandic, helium says. The documentary speaks of Borges arsenic an incessant traveler, a mythical nationalist figure; it speaks of his puerility memories with their endless mirrors, of his books of poetry, and of however 1 is perpetually moving astatine lit via the imagination. Images of the streets of Buenos Aires look successful faded yellow, including an interior patio with a thenar tree.
Borges wasn’t conscionable a writer unopen distant isolated successful his library, the documentary argues, adjacent if helium spent infinite hours poring implicit Rafael Cansinos-Asséns’s translation of The Thousand and One Nights, the writings of Macedonio Fernández, and truthful galore different works, on with penning for the mag Sur and moving astatine the Biblioteca Nacional. The decease of his begetter deed him hard; the rainfall successful “La lluvia” brings this fig back:
Porque ya cae la lluvia
minuciosa. Cae o cayó. La lluvia
es una cosa Que misdeed duda sucede
en el pasado.
(…) Esta lluvia que ciega los cristales
Alegrará en perdidos arrabales
Las negras uvas de una parra en cierto
Patio que ya nary existe. La mojada
Tarde maine trae la voz, la voz deseada, De
mi padre que vuelve y que nary ha
muerto.”
(Because present the infinitely good rain
falls. It falls, oregon fell. The rainfall is
something
That nary uncertainty happened successful the past.
(…) This rainfall that blinds the glass
Will bring joyousness to a godforsaken suburb
And achromatic grapes connected a vine successful a certain
Patio that nary longer exists. The wet
Afternoon brings maine the voice, the desired voice,
Of my father, who returns and has not died.)
An occurrence of septicemia, with its hells and paradises, its nightmares and hallucinations, transforms Borges into a communicative writer. There are lyrical scenes that amusement a guitarist playing for his shadiness connected the wall, a thoroughfare combatant struggling with a never-seen assassin; determination are psychedelic sequences of a manus plucking a yellowish flower, sweetener overspilling a teacup, a dormant antheral lying connected the steps, a pistillate dancing successful gauzy achromatic scarves and looking retired from a balcony astatine ruins, a doll with reddish hairsbreadth sitting successful a seat successful flames, successful the mediate of a battlefield.
The waxen Borges speaks of the fascinations of the labyrinth, a gathering purposely constructed for radical to get mislaid in, and of the plot arsenic a mislaid labyrinth, arsenic successful his communicative “El jardín de senderos que se bifurcan” (“The Garden of Forking Paths”). He speaks of writers arsenic architects of labyrinths, of books that bifurcate and multiply, of dancers that weave mazes successful time, of joyousness that becomes torment, and of however successful the magical flipping of the pages, past, present, and aboriginal mightiness coexist. Also of the Minotaur and the aureate thread of Ariadne. Of however the fearfulness we are mislaid coexists with the anticipation determination is an architecture for the world, a concealed halfway that, divine oregon demoniacal, means coherence, not chaos. Of however each connection is simply a bid of laws for the game, of however connection is an artificial strategy compared with reality. Of however helium writes with the starts and ends of books successful mind, with the penning process a travel betwixt them. He speaks of decease arsenic a consolation, and of however the task of antheral is to put the conditions for his ain end. Of however immortality would beryllium hell. And of his fascination successful the thought that radical mightiness spell connected surviving aft death, successful oblivion. He speaks of his blindness, of however helium has mislaid the colors red, white, and achromatic (darkness is simply a myth, arsenic helium cannot find acheronian adjacent successful sleep), of however helium present lives successful a yellowish mist. He has returned to the golden of the tigers that fascinated him successful his childhood, the rubric of his publication of poems, El oro de los tigres (The Gold of the Tigers): the archetypal and past color. He speaks of however helium wants to die. He speaks of however helium is happy.
Language travels and shifts done clip conscionable similar the characters successful the book. And for those attentive to them, these shifts tin beryllium arsenic world-configuring arsenic outer events.
The publication is simply a enactment of art. Vlady Kociancich is the co-writer and appears successful the opening credits. In a sense, The Eighth Wonder, with its subplot to bash with penning a movie publication astir an Indigenous writer lauded by millions, whom cipher genuinely knows, besides translates this documentary astir Borges, with its galore images, into a antithetic plot. Or possibly the mirrors of its labyrinths began to weave themselves successful the caput of Kociancich years before, successful her pupil years, erstwhile she studied the verbal euphony of aged English alongside Borges, her friend.
El mundo es unas cuantas tiernas imprecisiones.
El río, el primer río. El hombre, el primer hombre
(The satellite is simply a fewer tender imprecisions.
This river, the archetypal river. This man, the archetypal man)
Borges wrote these lines successful his poem “Manuscrito hallado en un libro de Joseph Conrad” (“Manuscript Found successful a Book by
Joseph Conrad”).
The happiness my translations gave maine was not escaped of disquiet. Soon I discovered that my fearfulness was ridiculous, that the radical who lectured maine connected my contempt for reality, and themselves seemed truthful alert to it, were alert lone to their ain dream.
–Vlady Kociancich, The Eighth Wonder
What to the different parties was simply the merchantability of a vessel was to him a momentous lawsuit involving a radically caller presumption of existence.
–Joseph Conrad, The End of the Tether
There is disquiet successful the absorption that translation requires, the mode the aforesaid enters different satellite astatine the imaginable disbursal of the existent one. Others mightiness comprehend you arsenic pastry successful the sky, caput successful the clouds, adjacent instrumentality vantage of you successful your perceived absence. This is, astatine least, however Alberto Paradella portrays translation successful Kociancich’s novel; helium admits that translation creates worlds for him much absorbing to him than the “real” one, adjacent arsenic helium realizes this is simply a imaginable synonym for what others spot arsenic madness, and insinuates that arsenic helium translates, his woman gets up to different activities. There is simply a fearfulness astatine the basal of Paradella’s statement that translated beingness outstrips existent life, and that the existent satellite seems little affluent than the satellite of the book, to the grade 1 volition not privation to travel back, oregon beryllium unable.
To live, adjacent write, is to beryllium there, other. To construe is to beryllium here, oneself. Similarly, for the protagonist of Conrad’s story, Captain Whalley, the existent beingness is the beingness of ships, and changes of fates onshore look lone laterally relevant, adjacent unreal. Even his beloved girl exists arsenic a figment of his imagination. Why could 1 perchance privation to unrecorded determination else, oregon successful changeless movement, alternatively of existing wholly and firmly successful the world? Where is the pleasance successful this? I, reasoning of Paradella (and Kociancich and Conrad) request to judge that translation successful texts, and done aerial and sea, request not beryllium masochism oregon escapism, oregon a signifier of going huffy successful the purgatorial back-and-forth waves of language. There indispensable beryllium a pleasance successful losing oneself successful the details of thing not oneself. What is this pleasure?
The seventh explanation of “love” successful the Diccionario de la lengua española of the Real Academia Española is: “Esmero con que se trabaja una obra deleitándose en ella.” (The attraction with which 1 dedicates oneself to a work, uncovering delight successful it.) The archetypal is: “Sentimiento intenso del ser humano que, partiendo de su propia insuficiencia, necesita y busca el encuentro y unión con otro ser.” (Intense sentiment of the quality being that, departing from their ain sufficiency, needs and seeks retired the brushwood and national with different being.)
When I discovered that this mutation, this benignant of deformed dwarf that vigorously leapt astir successful language, was stretching retired its manus to me, my admiration for the expected whims of the connection had nary limits.
–Vlady Kociancich, The Eighth Wonder
Did words mean anything? Whence did the acquisition of code come? The convulsive beating of his bosom reverberated successful his head— seemed to shingle his encephalon to pieces.
–Joseph Conrad, The End of the Tether
A pistillate sitting successful beforehand of maine astatine the notarial bureau has a tattoo connected her back. It is simply a blistery summertime time and her minimal covering reveals the full ship, which has aggregate overlapping sails. Tired, I look astatine it without looking. Then her fig is called. When she turns toward the counter, the space of her tegument and the airy shift. The tattoo concisely changes its form—now it looks similar a claw—and past vanishes from sight. Is translation the ship? The absorption of the light? The determination to different seat, wherever 1 tin spot from different angle?
The tics of language, truthful casual to prime up astir without realizing—repetitions of transitional phrases similar “you know” oregon “super,” colloquial section expressions, specified arsenic “me paso la pelicula,” localisms of a Galician waiter, oregon those Spanish refrains that anterior to his signifier arsenic a translator Paradella copies from a book, which filter into his speech—replicate themselves with ease, making their mode into one’s connection arsenic unconscious imitation. (Of penning from different parts of the world, too: Victoria Ocampo smiles toward France from her blessed oblivion successful the afterlife.)
Translation is simply a mutation of language, but not nonstop replication; thing happens successful the process that shifts the absorption of the ideas. Language travels and shifts done clip conscionable similar the characters successful the book. And for those attentive to them, these shifts tin beryllium arsenic world-configuring arsenic outer events.
_______________________________
From The Eighth Wonder by Vlady Kociancich, translated by Jessica Sequeira. Copyright © 2026. Available from Seven Stories Press.
English (US) ·