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Hawking's goal was to understand the mind of God. Photograph: Bettmann/Corbis A new book is a bit like a baby universe. The moment of conception is always obscure and its birth uncertain. Then it bursts into the public consciousness and either undergoes swift collapse or experiences a brief, hectic period of runaway inflation before settling down to steady expansion and a continuously cooling reception: either shining on library shelves or surviving as cold, dark matter on the remainder pile. Cosmology books were once especially vulnerable to early failure. Before 1965 – with the discovery of echoes of the big bang in the form of cosmic background radiation – they contained about as much scientific authority as the Book of Genesis, and made their case with considerably less conviction. Even after the confirmation in 1965 that the universe must indeed have experienced a beginning, cosmology books tended to be short-lived. There has been one notable ex...

Alguns dos mais importantes escritores portugueses deixaram o seu nome associado a traduções que ainda hoje são consideradas de referência, dificilmente ultrapassáveis no rigor e na qualidade literária. Dois exemplos, entre outros, são os de Jorge de Sena, com a tradução de «Palmeiras bravas», de um dos mais complexos prosadores do século XX, o norte-americano William Faulkner, e Ruy Belo, com «Moravagine», a obra magna de Blaise Cendrars, escritor francês de origem suíça. Nem sempre as traduções foram no passado, ou são hoje, feitas a partir do texto original. Aconteceu assim, e em alguns casos acontece ainda, com as literaturas em línguas eslavas e as do norte da Europa - sueca, dinamarquesa, finlandesa, norueguesa -, que tinham, e têm, de passar primeiro pelo «crivo» do francês ou do inglês, só então sendo vertidas para português. Não sendo ainda a ideal, a situação - neste particular do respeito pela versão original - registou progressos nos últimos anos e há hoje um...

California, sigh... In the past five years, Andres has raked over 100 designs into the beaches of the San Francisco Bay area He is currently planning to seek out new beaches around the world in which he can produce his work He believes that the fleeting nature of his artwork is what most captures the imaginations of his fans Telegraph

A thought occurred to me while listening to Clint Mansell and the Sonus Quartet launch into a stunning rendition of Death is the Road to Awe from the soundtrack to The Fountain at a recent Union Chapel gig. I thought, I know who'd love this: people. People would love this. Not just fans of film music, but fans of music. Anyone with ears, really. Mansell's music could, and indeed should, sit comfortably alongside Sigur Ros, Mogwai and Godspeed You Black Emperor, it's as complex, tuneful and experimental as any of them. The reason he isn't considered their peer is simple: he makes film music. The Union Chapel gig sold out with little advertising, but where would you advertise such a thing? The rock press? Film magazines? In music journalism and marketing, context seems massively important, but to the consumer it's virtually meaningless. Movies generate an amazing amount of music, almost all of them have an original score and much of it is just too good not to have a...

After trawling second hand bookshops looking for novels, she'll spend months carefully slicing the paper to create impressive works of art The pieces, which are worth up to £5,000 each, only consist of the pages that have been cut or removed from the book itself She never uses first editions or rare books, but Miss Blackwell had to overcome an initial sense of guilt when cutting up the books "I began feeling guilty about cutting up the books but I had the integrity that I would create something magical from it" More from the Telegraph

Gilda Lopes Encarnação demorou cerca de ano e meio a traduzir "A Montanha Mágica". Está actualmente a traduzir "Os Buddenbrook" Não tarda nada, "A Montanha Mágica" faz 100 anos e só agora surge pela primeira vez em Portugal numa tradução directa do alemão, sem passar por nenhum intermediário. A versão disponível desde os anos 50 era a tradução feita para o Brasil por Herbert Caro, judeu alemão exilado em Porto Alegre, publicada pela Livros de Brasil (que também editou as traduções de Caro de outros dois romances de Mann, "Os Buddenbrook" e "Doutor Fausto"). Uma tradução "meritória" e "competente no que toca à compreensão do original", avalia o escritor e ensaísta Frederico Lourenço. "Mas não é de forma alguma uma obra de arte em língua portuguesa. Isso é que fazia falta." Gilda Lopes Encarnação, tradutora da nova edição, com selo da Dom Quixote, diz que a versão que já existia "não é má porque não é er...

From our Translation Forum

Bo Burnham

The SeaBreacher at the Telegraph

Quase todos os editores têm na sala onde trabalham uma estante repleta para onde relanceiam às vezes um olhar inquieto. São as traduções «encalhadas» à espera de uma revisão que as torne publicáveis. Resultaram de pedidos feitos a embaixadas para indicarem tradutores do sueco, japonês ou persa e que, apesar dos muitos anos no nosso país, produziram textos num português tão fluente como o dos manuais de aspiradores chineses. Mas mesmo quando se teve a precaução de pedir a tradução a alguém que tem o português como língua materna, há catástrofes difíceis de corrigir, traduções do inglês, francês, castelhano ou alemão que passam ao lado, em que onde devia surgir «pálido» está «esbatido» e «furtivo» é confundido com «esquivo». E há também expressões idiomáticas tomadas à letra e alguém desastrado ( fingers and thumbs ) surge «inesperadamente» como tendo «dedos e polegares». Encontrar um tradutor que tenha, para usar a expressão de Umberto Eco, uma «apaixonada cumplicidade» com o livro que ...

One of my favourite André Kertész photographs shows two young men sitting with their backs to a tree, each absorbed in a book. Both are wearing glasses; both use their thighs as a lectern; the one facing forwards is black, the other, in profile (a dead ringer for Woody Allen), is white. Their proximity suggests they know each other and are friends. And given the time and place of the composition, the photo could serve as an icon of the civil rights movement – racial harmony as observed in Washington Square, New York City, 1969. What's equally striking, though, is how separate the two men are, how oblivious to each other's presence (and to the camera). They might be friends but their real companions are their books. The Budapest-born Kertész enjoyed a long life (1894-1985), visited many countries and was involved in several different artistic movements. But wherever he went and whatever the commission, a constant preoccupation was with people reading. In one of his earliest and ...

Liu Bolin is able to blend into any surroundings - no matter how complicated they might be "My work is a kind of reminder, to remind people what the community we live in really looks like, and what kind of problems exist". "The situation for artists in China is very difficult," he says."The forced removal of the artist's studio is in fact my direct inspiration for this series, 'Hiding in the city'" . Liu said his work requires a lot of patience with him having to pose and work on his photographs for more than 10 hours at a time to get it just right. Telegraph

Lisbon's Bairro Alto neighborhood has managed to become one of the city's most popular and yet still remain among its quirkiest, home to a budding collection of eclectic shopping, raucous nightlife and interesting food. This shot, by Flickr user (flicts) , offers a good approximation of what Bairro Alto is all about. The first-person reflection in the fisheye mirror lends us a surprisingly intimate look inside a local shop, making the viewer feel as though they were there, browsing right alongside the photographer. Have any shots of your own you'd like to have considered as our Photo of the Day ? Upload your best photos to our Gadling group on Flickr.

The ultimate vacation home: a lighthouse Thinking of curing those recession blues by investing in a vacation home? Why go for the traditional beach-side bungalow or alpine chalet when you could get something a little more original? Perhaps 76 acres of undeveloped beach and a famous lighthouse in the southwest of England would be just the thing? Upton Towans beach in Gwithian, Cornwall, is up for sale . It was here that a young Virginia Woolf used to vacation with her family, and the broad beach and beautiful view of the offshore lighthouse are said to have inspired her 1927 novel To the Lighthouse . The 86-foot tall Godrevy Lighthouse, pictured here, was built in 1858 after the SS Nile crashed into the nearby rocks and sank with all hands. It's one of the most attractive lighthouses on the English coast and draws in thousands of tourists a year, who also stroll along the beach and surf in the rough waters. Bidding for the land, which will benefit Hall for Cornwall theater, i...

Canongate has signed a deal with Life of Pi author Yann Martel, for an allegorical tale about the Holocaust, the Sunday Times has reported. As with his 2002 Man Booker-winning novel, the new book will include animals as key characters, as “Henry, a writer, strikes up a friendship with a taxidermist who is writing a play about the animals”. The article added that the book would make comparisons with Dante’s Inferno : the working title features eponymous heroes Beatrice, a donkey, and a monkey, Virgil, reflecting Dante's The Divine Comedy , which included Virgil as his guide through Hell and Beatrice through Heaven. "I've noticed over years of reading books on the Holocaust that it's nearly always represented the same way—historical or social realism." said Martel. "I think writers have been fearful of letting the imagination loose on the Holocaust. My novel is an attempt to see if there is a way of talking about the Holocaust without talking about it literal...

(I want this Google logo in better resolution and all)

Excerpt PROLOGUE Letter from Mina Harker to her son Quincey Harker, Esq. (To be opened upon the sudden or unnatural death of Wilhelmina Harker) 9th March 1912 Dear Quincey, My dear son, all your life you have suspected that there have been secrets between us. I fear that the time has come to reveal the truth to you. To deny it any longer would put both your life and your immortal soul in jeopardy. Your dear father and I chose to keep the secrets of our past from you in order to shield you from the darkness that shrouds this world. We had hoped to allow you a childhood free from the fears that have haunted us all our adult lives. As you grew into the promising young man you are today we chose not to tell you what we knew lest you think us mad. Forgive us. If you are reading this letter now, then the evil we so desperately and perhaps wrongly sought to shield you from has returned. And now you, like your parents before you, are in grave danger. In the year 1888, when your father and ...

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For many people, ghosts, vampires, zombies, and the like are no more than Hollywood fantasy. However, these movies have increasingly come to reflect popularly held pseudoscientific beliefs. For instance, the 2005 movie White Noise is based on the new trend among paranormalists—Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP). The occult underground in both America and Europe is witnessing a trendy rise in vampirism, and belief in voodoo zombiefication is widespread in many parts of South America and Africa. Furthermore, paranormal depictions in the media, especially television and Hollywood, have a definite influence on the way people think about paranormal claims(see, for example, Sparks 1998 and Sparks 2006). In this article, we point out inconsistencies associated with the ghost, vampire, and zombie mythologies as portrayed in popular films and folklore and give practical explanations to some of their features. Of course, the paranormalist or occultist could claim that the Hollywood portrayal is a ...

And it already exists in Spanish, titled Nocturna, translated by Santiago Ochoa. Did he have Guillermo's help and advice? Click on either - or both - to read excerpts in English and Spanish ;)

I know he's 87, and possibly a little less than the 6ft 5in he once claimed, but when Her Majesty comes to knight Christopher Lee, I hope she'll keep a firm grip on the sword and make sure he's on his knees. Old habits die hard, and Sir Christopher might attempt a leap at her very throat. He is not to be treated lightly just because that raven black hair has turned to silver. Of course, the first knight of horror (if I may be so bold) will have to see if his and the Queen's schedules can overlap. He has opened more veins and amazed eyes than she has named bridges and battleships. His record of work includes more than 250 jobs in film and television, dating from when he apparently carried a spear in Olivier's Hamlet (1948). The same biographical sketch that lists the parts claims Lee was born in Belgravia. That sounds auspicious until you wonder - above stairs or below? Lee does have his credentials: Italianate-named forbears, the rumour of Wellington College, the Ro...

Why the most peaceful people on earth write the greatest homicide thrillers. Having read close to 30 Scandinavian crime novels over the last several months, I can come to only one conclusion: Scandinavia is a bleak, ungodly, extraordinarily violent place to live. The capitals are seething hot pots of murder. In Oslo, a serial killer slips red diamond pentagrams under the eyelids of his victims (Jo Nesbø's The Devil's Star ), while in Stockholm a stalker terrorizes young girls in public parks (Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö's The Man on the Balcony ). The situation is even worse at the local level. Take, for instance, Ystad, population 17,000, a quaint fishing village on Sweden's southern shore best known for its high-speed ferry terminal. It has suffered, in the novels of Henning Mankell, the following horrors: the torture and execution of an elderly farmer and his wife ( Faceless Killers ); the torture and execution of two men who are found floating off the coast in a life...

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On HBO's True Blood (Sundays, 9 ET/PT), Lafayette asked vampire sheriff Eric to turn him. And Twilight found Bella Swan begging immortal beloved Edward Cullen to make her a vampire. Before folks swear off sunlight, they should know the basics, which would be easier if the rules didn't change in every film, book and TV show. USA TODAY offers a guide to life (and after). 'True Blood' 'Twilight' ' Angel' What just happened to me? A vampire drained your blood and replaced it with some of his own; the two of you were buried together for a day to transfer his vampire's "essence" to you. Then you rose as a vampire. A vampire bit you in several places, injecting venom that coursed through your veins, incinerating your organs and finally s...