Reader recommendation: The Artist of Disappearance
Monitor readers share their favorite book picks.
February 9, 2012
The Artist of Disappearance, by Anita Desai, is a collection of three novellas, all set in India. In “Translator, Translated,” an Indian schoolteacher translating a work from a little-known Indian language into English decides to become inventive and takes liberties with the text to “improve” it. She comes to think of herself as the writer, only better. Discovery seems remote, until she is unmasked. Desai shines a light on the ethics of translation.