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Alain Badiou: a collaborative translation


This was the first and only and only collaboration I did with Simon Krysl. A piece by Alain Badiou, the French philosopher. We both came to the translation from very different areas of strength: Simon, a deep thorough knowledge of marxist philosphy; me, French language. I was living in Maine, my first year out of graduate school. He had moved back to Prague, so all our communications were online, and even more specifically, in our footnotes. Have you ever looked for a translation of a word you thought you knew the meaning, but find instead online forums where translators debate the finer points of the word "to draw," (for instance)? This was our footnotes: comments back and forth on the subtle meaning of many words. One of the more joyous translation experiences, perhaps because it was shared. Badiou's piece is a reaction to Deleuze and Guattari's Anti-OEdipus, a monumental piece of contemporary philosophy. I include the wikipedia link here: our translation of this piece by Badiou is listed in the "Further Reading," section of the entry, so we must have done something right? Sadly, I cannot find our original shared document. If ever I do, I will be looking for our footnotes. (with Simon Krysl), Alain Badiou, The Flux and The Party: in the Margins of Anti-Oedipus, Polygraph, 2004.


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