Found in Translation by Maryanne Hannan

Three out of every hundred books published annually are translations, and the majority of those translations are from English, according to Safwan Masri, Dean of Georgetown University in Qatar, speaking at the 2025 Georgetown Global Dialogues held in Rome on June 9 through 10. This asymmetry reflects the Global North’s lack of interest in the cultural productions of the Global South, the vast African, Asian, and Latin American continents. To spotlight this imbalance, the two-day conference brought together artists and intellectuals to discuss the theme of “Human Fraternity in a Divided World” in the context of Pope Francis’s 2020 encyclical Fratelli Tutti.

One fear of such a gathering is talk that goes nowhere, preaching to and from the choir, unwarranted optimism given our desperate and widespread political, ecological, and economic distress, and repeated encomia for the pope’s vision. It was quite the opposite, a “catholic” (in the best sense) gathering. The emphatic voices of Nesrine Malik (British-Sudanese), Pankaj Mishra (Indian), Mohsin Hamid (British-Pakistani), Hisham Matar (Libyan descent), and Ece Temelkuran (Turkish), among others, guaranteed that voices from the Global South rang out loudly. Francis’s spirit hovered over all—not by constant invocation, but by general acknowledgment of his moral leadership and by specific recollections, especially those offered by Jesuit Antonio Spadaro, undersecretary for the Vatican’s Dicastery for Culture and Education. A book gathering the miscellany of Francis’s comments on literature will soon be published.

In the face of the participants’ well-articulated passion, it is difficult to be smug, which is exactly the hope the Francis’s encyclical offers: that our shared vulnerability can be a source of grace and true encounter. Fratelli Tutti affirms the value of cultural narratives grounded in human dignity and mutual learning. But these principles become clearer when I hear Zadie Smith’s surprising take: “If the protagonist is not white, then the theme of the book is assumed to be Identity.” A mistake I could make, thinking I was being open to human encounter. Another reminder that we never know what we don’t know—and its corollary, that what we think we know may be incorrect. The current cultural impasse demands new ways of thinking if we are to move forward.

The desired reorientation of global discourse involves the religious and secular, according to Francis, and literature can function as a natural space of encounter. A member of the audience, noting the conference was occurring in the shadow of Pentecost, suggested that just as the disciples spoke in a way that people of different languages could understand them, was that not also the role of artists to create a new language understandable to all? Father Spadaro hedged his answer by referring to Francis’s preference for the “incomplete,” the ability of poetry to go beyond language, to go beyond known borders.

In another panel, Ece Temelkuran suggested that poetry exists somewhere between the realm of religion and secular thought. Mohsin Hamid referred to the strategy of Sufi poetry in the Islamic tradition to capture a deep experience in words not overly determined or circumscribed so they are open to everyone. As novelists write “half” novels and individual readers make them whole, so can the poetic gesture use “half” words and invite fellow humans into that space. Good literature solves nothing with definite answers; rather, it complicates and deepens issues. And good critical theory is impossible without this kind of collaborative input, however disquieting it may be to hear someone’s assumptions overturned.

These discussions were serious and wide-ranging, as befits the problems we face. There were twelve panels in two days. Presenters were so engaged that they continued to ask questions and dialogue with the audience in subsequent panels. There was an enlightening discussion on the concept of exile. Nesrine Malik offered a conclusion, “Fraternity is core to who we are,” after critiquing the dismantling of fraternity by prevailing power structures which frame scarcity as fundamental and pit us against one another. When questioned about the darkness, she recoiled, saying we cannot always take ourselves so seriously. Instead, she said, it is time to invoke Pope Francis, who recognized laughter as revolutionary: “He was a man of humor.”

Another conference planned for Barcelona in November 2025 will continue the discussion, and hopefully the camaraderie. ♦

A poet and frequent book reviewer, Maryanne Hannan is a member of the National Book Critics Circle. A resident of upstate New York, she is the author of Rocking Like It’s All Intermezzo: 21st-Century Psalm Responsorials (Wipf and Stock, 2019). More information at www.mhannan.com.

Image: Detail from 12th-century polyglot Psalter from the Dayr al-Suryan monastery in the Nitrian desert, featuring Ethiopic, Syriac, Coptic, Arabic, and Armenian text