@jaybossrubin
Literary translator from Swahili. Out now: ROSA MISTIKA by Euphrase Kezilahabi (Yale University Press); THE WITNESS OF NINA MVUNGI AND OTHER STORIES by Esther Karin Mngodo (Hanging Loose Press). I also serve as Managing Editor of Portland Tennis Courterly.
I reviewed I WAS ALIVE HERE ONCE: GHOST STORIES for Asymptote. The collection, from @twolinespress.com's Calico series, features ghost stories from Korea, Yemen, Poland, Japan, Uzbekistan, Iceland, Tanzania and Thailand. Who knew the dead could be so lively www.asymptotejournal.com/blog/2026/02...
In an interview w/ @africasacountry.bsky.social, Ainehi Edoro discusses her new book, FOREST IMAGINARIES: HOW AFRICAN NOVELS THINK and how indigenous storytelling and cosmology expands what the novel can do. bit.ly/4rRlY8A @brittlepaper.bsky.social @columbiaup.bsky.social
Digital flyer for a literary translation reading at Browsers Bookshop in Olympia, Washington, at 4 p.m. on Saturday, February 14th.
This Saturday ❤️2/14❤️ at Browsers Bookshop in Olympia, Washington: a special "love"-themed reading from THE WITNESS OF NINA MVUNGI AND OTHER STORIES by Esther Karin Mngodo. Reading starts at 4 p.m. Karibuni :)
📢 @northwestreview.bsky.social is open for submissions of works in translation! Learn more and submit here.
And much gratitude to the Best Literary Translation series co-editors: @wendycall.bsky.social, @kolatubosun.bsky.social, Noh Anothai and Öykü Tekten. Asanteni sana.
Cover of BEST LITERARY TRANSLATIONS 2026, guest-edited by U.S. Poet Laureate Arthur Sze.
An interior page of BEST LITERARY TRANSLATIONS 2026, featuring the opening sentence of "The Fish Market" by Esther Karin Mngodo, translated from the Swahili by Jay Boss Rubin, and originally published in THE COMMON. "The smell of fish at the ferry landing is so different from how they smell at home, stored away in the freezer, you tell your driver Ibrahimu as the two of you walk toward the fish market."
Honored to be included in BEST LITERARY TRANSLATIONS 2026, guest-edited by U.S. Poet Laureate Arthur Sze, to be published by @deepvellum.bsky.social on 4/14. Thanks to @koimolove.bsky.social for writing the beautiful story; thanks to @commonmag.bsky.social for publishing it and nominating it to BLT.
BEST LITERARY TRANSLATIONS 2026 is available for preorder!
Guest edited by National Book Award winner Arthur Sze, BLT 2026 is compiled from over 450 submissions written in 62 original languages and features poetry and prose written in languages both widely spoken and critically endangered.
Mahmood Mamdani Launches New Book To Full Houses in Nairobi
#BookLaunch
www.writingafrica.com/mahmood-mamd...
I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good.
Stay free
Hats off to Shaina and Rodrigo, alums of @artomi.bsky.social's Translation Lab 2024, for this new spin on a magic kingdom story.
Tsitsi Dangarembga receives Sharjah Lifetime Achievement in Literature Award 2026
www.writingafrica.com/tsitsi-danga...
The contributors for Fictionable's Winter 2025 issue from top left: Rodrigo Urquiola Flores, Cynthia Zarin, Tim Conley, Shaina Brassard, Cynthia Banham, Joanna Kavenna and Samuel Rigg
#Winter is here with #ShortStories from Cynthia Zarin, Rodrigo Urquiola Flores translated by Shaina Brassard, Tim Conley, Cynthia Banham and Samuel Rigg – and Joanna Kavenna on the non-truth truth of #fiction
Catch them all at fictionable.world
#books #reading #writing #comics #translation #blog
A screengrab of new Portland City Council President Jamie Dunphy at a city council meeting, responding to the idea of electing him president by saying "This is not something that I have been seeking and not something I'm excited about."
me when my friends want to hang out
Translation Tuesday #literarytranslation reading, one week from today at Mother Foucault's Bookshop in #Portland. Featuring three translators, poetry and prose, Swahili, Hungarian, and Spanish. www.motherfoucaultsbookshop.com/calendar-lis...
What a list! Our eye is immediately drawn to "the first collection of Swahili Afro-Speculative fiction in English, The Witness of Nina Mvungi and Other Stories by Esther Karin Mngodo", but this collection of reccos could keep us going for all 2026, pretty sure
#booksky #weird #literature
Asante sana kwa pongezi, Prof. Mabala. Heri ya Mwaka Mpya!
Wrapping up 2025 with translations of three poems by Euphrase Kezilahabi, published today in The Fortnightly Review. Happy New Year / Heri ya Mwaka Mpya to all!! fortnightlyreview.substack.com/p/translatio...
THE WITNESS OF NINA MVUNGI AND OTHER STORIES made @hfr.bsky.social 's year-end list. Honored to be among the weirdos heavyfeatherreview.org/2025/12/29/w...
“Brother Morpheme had succeeded in keeping his emotions out of his work for the 150,982 assignments he’d handled prior to Ms. Mvungi.”
Up now: “The Witness of Nina Mvungi” by @koimolove.bsky.social, translated by @jaybossrubin.bsky.social. Art by Valerie Hammond. evergreenreview.com/read/the-wit...
Very fine essay on teaching Kiswahili in Istanbul, by Abdirashid Diriye Kalmoy. Because of its hybridity and ability to connect Africa and the wider world, teaching Swahili in Istanbul is "not an accidental exercise, but a continuation of this cosmopolitan spirit." www.dailysabah.com/opinion/op-e...
"[They] show us that an original is perhaps just a façade, that art is not made in intellectual solitude but through connections, molded together in community. Because translation is built on such connection, it becomes much easier to recognize it as a human act instead of a mechanical one" [end].
Cont'd: "The Witness of Nina Mvungi and Other Stories seems to state that they can ... Mngodo and Rubin push back on the idea that a translator could somehow 'interfere' with the original, but they call to question the very idea of an original."
Suzuki on the subject-witness, author-translator parallel: "Like a Witness, translators work behind a curtain, expected to adhere to the strict rule of not 'interfering' with the original. But what is the benefit of a translator’s disappearance? Could the translator stand alongside the author?"
Just published on the Asymptote Blog: a beautifully crafted and incredibly insightful review of THE WITNESS OF NINA MVUNGI AND OTHER STORIES by @koimolove.bsky.social. Review by Rebecca Suzuki—hybrid forms specialist + fellow translator www.asymptotejournal.com/blog/2025/12...
Love-love. There will always be a home for pun-laden, politically attuned tennis reporting in our pages!
I did! As did PTQ Editor-in-Chief Tyler Pell. We texted each other the link at the exact same moment.
We at Portland Tennis Courterly are honored and humbled to feature the brilliant writing + brave reporting of @marisakabas.bsky.social in our latest issue. This is a reprint of her dispatch from the US Open, which first appeared in The Handbasket on September 8th www.thehandbasket.co/p/trump-us-o...
Thanks for the shoutout, Marisa, and keep up the incredible work!
And the final piece in the collection—the title story, "The Witness of Nina Mvungi"—is out today in @evergreenreview.bsky.social, accompanied by beautiful artwork from Valerie Hammond. Thanks to Africa Editor Jeffery Renard Allen for all the support. "Ninaaaaaaa!" evergreenreview.com/read/the-wit...
And the final piece in the collection—the title story, "The Witness of Nina Mvungi"—is out today in @evergreenreview.bsky.social, accompanied by beautiful artwork from Valerie Hammond. Thanks to Africa Editor Jeffery Renard Allen for all the support. "Ninaaaaaaa!" evergreenreview.com/read/the-wit...