|
|
A book that has always held an
actual as well as symbolic interest for me is J. M. Barrie's
Peter Pan
- which was really the novel based on his own play.
The very concept of a boy who never grows up, living in a neverland of
playacting, but which is nonetheless incredibly dangerous, fascinated
me. To the point that I named my first collection of adult short
stories From
NeverNeverLand.
I decided to translate the book in the early 1990's, and was faced
with the challenge of keeping intact in Maltese the nuance in
Victorian English, without seeming bombastic or swerving too
drastically from normal Maltese. I wrote a bit of the trials and
tribulations of translating such a book in the critical foreward to
the book itself.
Illustrating the book was also a challenge, given that greats like
Michael Foreman, Arthur Rackham (GOSH!) and Mabel Lucie Attwel had
done it before me.
The book was published by PIN in 1993. |
