Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Summary and book reviews of Is That a Fish in Your Ear? by David Bellos, plus links to an excerpt from Is That a Fish in Your Ear? and a biography of David Bellos.

Funny and surprising on every page, Is That a Fish in Your Ear? offers readers new insight into the mystery of how we come to know what someone else means - whether we wish to understand Astérix cartoons or a foreign head of state. Using translation as his lens, David Bellos shows how much we can learn about ourselves by exploring the ways we use translation, from the historical roots of written language to the stylistic choices of Ingmar Bergman, from the United Nations General Assembly to the significance of James Cameron's Avatar. Is That a Fish in Your Ear? ranges across human experience to describe why translation sits deep within us all, and why we need it in so many situations, from the spread of religion to our appreciation of literature; indeed, Bellos claims that all writers are by definition translators. Written with joie de vivre, reveling both in misunderstanding and communication, littered with wonderful asides, it promises any reader new eyes through which to understand the world. In the words of Bellos: "The practice of translation rests on two presuppositions. The first is that we are all different: we speak different tongues, and see the world in ways that are deeply influenced by the particular features of the tongue that we speak. The second is that we are all the same - that we can share the same broad and narrow kinds of feelings, information, understandings, and so forth. Without both of these suppositions, translation could not exist. Nor could anything we would like to call social life. Translation is another name for the human condition."

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Bellos is enthusiastic about and dedicated to his subject, but in the quiet, careful tradition of an academic. Is That a Fish in Your Ear? does not read like an attempt to bring the power of translation to the masses - as Truss did with punctuation - but rather like an attempt to bring the power of the masses to translation. In many ways, Bellos has drawn a flow chart with Fish - one that distills everything down to only being as good as one's ability to translate it... Towards the conclusion, however, he draws back and gives readers a larger portrait of translation's role in global society and the human condition. This is where Bellos shines as an author, and demonstrates his knowledge and passion to a wider audience.  (Reviewed by Elizabeth Whitmore Funk).

Full Review (945 words).

Media Reviews

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel David Bellos writes like a person who chooses his words not only carefully but also confidently and pragmatically. Translation is a challenging enterprise, but one he embraces vigorously and without the gloomy pessimism that leads some to declare that it's impossible... Rich, often playful chapters.   Literary Review Is That A Fish In Your Ear? is spiced with good and provocative things. At once erudite and unpretentious... [it is a] scintillating bouillabaisse.   Kirkus Reviews Erudite and occasionally dense, but ultimately illuminating, even transformative.   Library Journal Not for everyone, but deep thinkers should find this a thought-provoking book.   Publishers Weekly Starred Review. It is a breeze to get lost in translation, and for this reason Bellos cannily exclaims, 'We should do more of it.'   The Scotsman, Jennie Erdal This book is a wonderful celebration of the sheer diversity of language and the place it occupies in human endeavour. Conducted by a man who clearly knows his stuff, it is a whirlwind tour round the highways and byways of translation in all its glorious forms... Bellos develops a fondness for bold statements that produce an occasional 'yes… but' response in the reader.   The Times (UK) Bellos has numerous paradoxes, anecdotes and witty solutions... his insights are thought provoking, paradoxical, and a brilliant exposition of mankind's attempts to deal with the Babel of global communication.   Sunday Telegraph (UK) [A] witty, erudite exploration... [Bellos] delights in [translation's] chequered past and its contemporary ubiquity... He would like us to do more of it. With the encouragement of this book, we might even begin to enjoy it. Natasha Wimmer, translator of Roberto Bolaño's Savage Detectives and 2666 Bellos dispels many of the gloomy truisms of the trade and reminds us what an infinitely flexible instrument the English language (or any language) is. Sparkling, independent-minded analysis of everything from Nabokov's insecurities to Google Translate's felicities fuels a tender - even romantic - account of our relationship with words.

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