Cover of The Translator

The Translator

In silken prose and with subtle suspense, Nina Schuyler brings us a mesmerizing novel of language and translation, memory loss and heartbreak, and the search for answers in a foreign country.

Read more

When renowned translator Hanne Schubert falls down a flight of stairs, her injury is an unusual but real condition—the loss of her native language. She is left speaking only Japanese, a language learned later in life. With her personal life at a crossroad, Hanne leaves for Japan. There, the Japanese novelist whose work she translated stunningly confronts her publicly for sabotaging his work.

Reeling, Hanne struggles for meaning and seeks out the inspiration for the author's novel—a tortured, chimerical actor, once a master in the art of Noh theater. Through their passionate and intriguing relationship, Hanne begins to understand the masks she has worn in her life, just as the actor dons the masks that have made him a legend of Noh. The demons from her past and present begin to unfold and Hanne sets out to make amends in this searing and engrossing novel.

Audience
adult
Length
medium · 303 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it. Point at it (on a phone, tap it) for less of it instead.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

Liked The Translator? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked The Translator. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. American Fuji Shares Japan, fiction, Asia
  2. The Heike Story: A Modern Translation of the Classic Tale of Love and War Shares Japan, Asia, fiction
  3. Precarious Japan Shares Japan, japanese
  4. The Goddess Chronicle Shares Japan, fiction, japanese

“People who read The Translator tend to reach for these next.”

  1. The Apprenticeship of Big Toe P
  2. Beyond the Blossoming Fields
  3. The Samurai
  4. Asunder

“If you want more of the same (historical fiction about relationships), start with these.”

  1. Rivalry: A Geisha's Tale (Japanese Studies Series)
  2. The River Ki
  3. Naomi
  4. The Broken Commandment

“If it was the Japan that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. Losing Kei
  2. One Morning Like A Bird
  3. Who is Mr Satoshi?
  4. Stone Field, True Arrow: A Novel

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. A Wild Haruki Chase: Reading Murakami Around the World
  2. The Street of a Thousand Blossoms
  3. Nevsky Prospect
  4. The Sun Gods