Making Magic of One Sort and Another

I think picture books are magic. At least the best ones are, and translating them naturally means remaking some magic.

But where the magic is, exactly, can be hard to put your finger on. Sometimes it lurks in the spaces, like the ones between the visual narrative and the verbal one. Sometimes it's in the page turn, and the way you see the next image before you process the words. It's delightful when, primed by the art, the words turn out to be a bit unexpected. Choosing words that give those spaces room to breathe, and room for readers to participate, is an act of magic.

Then there's the physical space. Some languages, like Japanese, are more efficient than English, and require economical translation. That's the case with The Mole Construction Company books, where the text doesn't get a lot of real estate in the first place. The English feels more succinct than the Japanese, but that keeps the larger-than-life construction vehicles in the spotlight, and they are the big draw after all. In comparison, the tiny moles are impressive for their sheer number, and just keeping up with who is who and where they are in the visual narrative is enough to keep a reader very busy!

Sometimes, the target language forces a translator to decide whether to gender a story (or go to great lengths not to). At other times, the opportunity to ungender a story presents itself, which can be quite nice. I'll Draw My Own Pictures is a first-person narrative through and through, told both visually and verbally from the narrator's point of view. Though we never see him, we know the narrator is a boy because he uses the male first-person pronoun 'boku'. Since English doesn't have that kind of option, the universal 'I' is really the only choice. But that allows every reader to see the world through the eyes of this narrator and discover the power of imagination to bring drawings to life. And that is magical.

There's some literal magic making in My Magic Dress, as there's no 'magic' in the Japanese title, or elsewhere in the book for that matter – at least not the hocus-pocus variety. Yet there is a kind of de facto magic – the sort that induces enchantment – in the way the little rabbit's dress changes to match the surroundings as she drifts from one place to another, and how she is so present in every moment and takes things as they come. But the English title has 'magic' to preserve the rhythm and alliteration of the Japanese, and the sense that this dress is very special indeed.

One last bit of magic to mention in closing is the power to transport a reader to a different place. Although the words in Panda Bath House are now in English, the art puts the reader squarely inside a traditional Japanese bath house. The lack of narration also contributes to the book's immersive quality, as the story is told entirely through dialogue. It feels like you're right there with the pandas, listening to them chatting as they soak, for one magical, everyday evening.