Language is wine upon the lips.
— Virginia Woolf

The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
— Ludwig Wittgenstein

The art of translation lies less in knowing the other language than in knowing your own.
— Ned Rorem

A translator is a reader, an interpreter and a creator all in one.
— Bijay Kumar Das

All recipe reading involves some degree of translation, even when it's in our own language. We read with certain conventions in mind, and we know to read older recipes differently. We make assumptions about the meaning on the page when we come to follow instructions. We (most often unconsciously) are interpreting all the time.

So how to translate words, language about food? We will start this conversation at the OFS Kitchen Table with a general introduction by Maureen Fant about her experience doing translation of recipes and other food writing: the cultural contextual issues that arise, word choices, and so much more, to get us thinking.

Anthony Buccini and Ken Albala will then report on their own observations in their wide reading and language explorations which relate to translation issues, such as where a translation was less than clear/ideal and why that might have been so.

The conversation will be moderated by Naomi Duguid.