February is comics month at Words Without Borders. This is the eighth year in a row they’ve brought graphic wonders from around the world in translation to American readers. I’m proud to have been a part of this effort right from the beginning, and have been lucky enough to have a piece in almost every one of these issues. I translated three excerpts you’ll find in this February’s issue:
- in Jeanine, see Matthias Picard render a series of interviews with a Swiss prostitute that form a rather tender biography
- watch Nicolas Wild smoke tariak in his Tehran travel memoir, Silent Was Zarathustra, at once an exploration of an ancient, renascent religion, Zorastrianism, and a true crime story into a professor’s murder
- laugh when politics meets office comedy in Weapons of Mass Diplomacy by Christophe Blain and Abel Lanzac, a  roman à clef about speechwriting for former French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin.
That makes 33 pieces (not counting one by Anouar Benmalek that due to a limited-duration rights contract was taken down), I’ve translated for Words Without Borders since 2005! I’m proud to be such a close and frequent contributor to the magazine that spearheaded the movement for global literature in the United States.
To commemorate the number 8—always a favorite of mine—most of my posts this month will be comics-related.