Translator Lisa Carter has been running a series of Translator Spotlights on her blog, Intralingo. Today, I’m the lucky guest. I hope you’ll visit (http://intralingo.com/?p=2938)–and have a look at some of the other translators who’ve been spotlighted as well! 
I’ve benefitted from Lisa’s collegiality and goodwill off line, too, so I’ll take this opportunity to broadcast thanks–for sharing the spotlight, and for trying to get that light to shine a little brighter, cast a wider glow.
In the same spirit, a handful of blogs I’ve recently found inspiring or instructive:
From Richard Bausch via The Entangled Writer, Cai Emmons: “there must be some central thing, some evolving central concern. This becomes the ‘aboutness’ of the story, and the actions, sufferings, falterings and successes of the characters, must ride over that like a cable car over a river.” I find this notion of “aboutness” wonderful; still tracing the cable, the river, the car–several directions at once, working together.
From The Blabbermouth, Linda P. Epstein (agent extraordinaire) and Stephanie Lipsey: Taking your character on vacation. I always take characters on vacation–why travel, if not to meditate on what you’re trying to write? (OK, yes, there’s the food, the scenery, the chance to spend a week or six in another language, the people to meet or meet again. But you know what I mean.) So: I take characters on vacation, I try to solve their problems (or give them better problems) while I look out the window of bus or plane or train. But I most often think about them, not with them. I’m enjoying this notion of sharing the protagonist’s meal. What if she doesn’t like what I like? What if she’s wild and scary and way more fun than I am?
And in translation: I’m lucky enough to be a member of dissertation committee for a Ph.D. candidate examining self-translation and bilingual writing. This post from Catharine Cellier-Smart on Self-Translation, an idea I still find problematic–not fully convinced it’s not just another kind of revision, of writing, full stop– raises some good questions, with lots of references.
What’s inspiring you this summer? What are you reconsidering?