Dancing on Ropes

Anna Aslanyan

£10.99

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Profile Books Ltd
5 May 2022
ISBN: 9781788162647
Paperback
272 pages

From the publisher

Horizon-expanding tales of how translators altered the course of world events

'Full of lively stories ... leaves the reader with an awed respect for the translator's task' Economist

Would Hiroshima have been bombed if Japanese contained a phrase meaning 'no comment'? Is it alright for missionaries to replace the Bible's 'white as snow' with 'white as fungus' in places where snow never falls? Who, or what, is Kuzma's mother, and why was Nikita Khrushchev so threateningly obsessed with her (or it)?

The course of diplomacy rarely runs smooth; without an invisible army of translators and interpreters, it could hardly run at all. Join veteran translator Anna Aslanyan to explore hidden histories of cunning and ambition, heroism and incompetence. Meet the figures behind the notable events of history, from the Great Game to Brexit, and discover just how far a simple misunderstanding can go.