Editor: Barbara Cassin. Translation Editors: Emily Apter, Jacques Lezra, Michael Wood
Publisher: Princeton University Press – 1,297 pages
Book Review by: Sonu Chandiram

This book contains nearly 400 words – concepts, and literary, philosophical, political terms – that are either difficult to translate from one language to another, or defy precise and complete translation because of lack of comparable words and / or meanings in other languages.

And, this book is not just a dictionary but also an encyclopedia. The words in it come from more than a dozen languages. Examples of these words are: Dasein (German), pravda (Russian), saudade (Portuguese) and stato (Italian).

The words that were chosen for this dictionary-encyclopedia are thoroughly examined by experts in cross-linguistic and cross-cultural complexities. The words come from different historical eras – classical, medieval, early modern, modern, and contemporary – and they are analyzed by some 150 scholars, in terms of:

  • Origins and meanings
  • History and context of usage
  • Translation into other languages
  • Use in notable texts

This book also contains essays on the special characteristics of these languages: English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.

Of what use is this book? It is an invaluable reference for students, scholars, and general readers interested in the origins of words, their meaning(s) in the eight other languages mentioned above, and how they were or are used in different languages.

This is a one-of-a-kind book in linguistics, so the editors named below have laid a new path of knowledge, for which commend and admire them.

 

Barbara Cassin is director of research at the Centre National de la Recherché Scientifique in Paris.
Emily Apter is professor of comparative literature and French at New York University.
Jacques Lezra is professor of Spanish, Portuguese, and Comparative Literature at New York University.
Michael Wood is the Charles Barnwell Straut Class of 1923 Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Princeton University.