The Linguist

14 The Linguist Vol/63 No/3 thelinguist.uberflip.com FEATURES Could you tell us where you grew up and how your interest in languages began? I was born in Oman and have vague memories of learning Arabic as a toddler. At around 7, I moved to Pakistan, and aged 18, I came to England. Growing up in a multilingual context may have inspired my interest in languages. But it's also something else – something akin to the fascination the protagonist of my first book feels. There is the excitement of it; the feeling that learning a new language can feel like solving a puzzle, and the act of translation can be engrossing, simultaneously mathematical and intuitive and creative. I speak Urdu/Hindi, English and some French, but I've also studied Arabic, German and briefly Farsi, and loved each one. What about your journey to becoming a writer and translator? After university, I worked for Saqi Books via a wonderful Arts Council scheme around diversity in publishing. Then I worked for literature festivals and wrote poetry, essays, short stories and plays. During lockdown, I had the time for a larger project, and wrote my first novel, The Centre. I was also working for the Trojan Horse Affair podcast, and watching those masterful storytellers construct each episode was beneficial to my own writing. I don't consider myself a translator, but I enjoy it. It started with wanting to hold on to and improve my Urdu, and I did this by reading novels and poetry. My first translations were of stories written by family members, and then I did a couple of works for publication. What is The Centre about? The book is about a Pakistani translator in London, Anisa, who comes across a mysterious language school called the Centre, which promises fluency in any language in just 10 days, but at a secret and sinister cost. It explores sexuality, appropriation, race, class and the politics of language learning. I tried to write in an intimate style, as if I were in conversation with, say, my best friend, or my sister, or my mother, and people seem to pick up on this. One reader said it was, at its heart, a story about racial capitalism, which I liked. It's both funny and dark, and also, on a another level, a straightforward thriller. Why did you decide to intersperse Urdu words and phrases through the novel? I didn't really decide in that way; it just felt like the right voice. This is, after all, how I operate in my own life, and Anisa, who has a similar trajectory, would also be interacting with her intimate ones in a mix of English and Urdu. I was able to maintain this style because the publishing industry has, I think, made some progress – for instance, we no longer have to italicise words that are not in English, nor must we have glossaries. Not having to translate everything meant a lot to me and spoke to the themes of the book. I think this helps in not pandering to a white gaze, and therefore allowed me to speak from a deeper place. So how has publishing changed? I don't know if this is naive or overly optimistic, but I feel like things have improved, and that there is more space now to tell stories from non-dominant perspectives. But also, the pandering to the white gaze comes from both within and without, so it's something I try to consciously dismantle within myself. And the book also examines this. For example, it interrogates Anisa's desire to translate 'great works of literature'. What is 'great literature'? Who decides? More and more, we are asking these questions. The characters have different attitudes towards language. For example, Anisa translates Bollywood films into English but feels like she's not a real translator. What causes her sense of inferiority? One of the things the book examines is linguistic hierarchies; how some languages are considered superior to others. When Anisa first goes to the Centre, she learns German, feeling that it is a 'real translator's' language. We also see this societal value judgement when Adam goes to Pakistan and speaks Urdu fluently. Suddenly, red carpets are rolled out for him, as if it's such an honour that this white man would lower himself to learn this language of ours. It's an internally absorbed notion which we ourselves may carry; ideas of shame or inferiority around the languages spoken in our homes that are not English. In Pakistan, the relationship between language and class is stark, English being the language of the elites, and English with an English accent being especially valued. Perhaps these are the things informing some of Anisa's discontent, her idea that books are superior to films and that 'great literature' is what she should be aiming for. When she learns Russian, she looks forward to reading Tolstoy and Chekhov – the people they call 'the greats'. What is it that makes them so great, she wonders. Could it be something in the language itself? These are some of the ideas we internalise around language and literature that felt exciting to interrogate. With her debut novel investigating the darker side of translation, the author positive changes in publishing to complicated relationships with language in AYESHA MANAZIR SID ANAM ZAFAR MEETS

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