lKd7nD

preserve the ethno-dialect of Spanish important to the story or
adjust the original Spanish so that the lexicon is intelligible to all
Latino ethnicities. The reason for this apparently contradictory
practice is to meet the needs with some books of a general
Spanish-language reader, and with others to faithfully portray
the local culture when it is important to the story. Our children’s
bilingual picture books are purchased nationwide by schools
and their suppliers for bilingual, dual language, and ESL classes,
and for migrant education and literacy programs. We have also
provided free-of-charge hundreds of thousands of bilingual
picture books dealing with health topics—these are distributed
in neighborhoods across the country by community health
workers (promotores) and county clinics.
As part of Piñata we also publish books for middle readers,
again with the same ethos, but in a different format. They are
more text-heavy, divided into various chapters and feature the
complete text in one language, followed by the translation in the
other—except that the translation is upside down in these “flip
books” rather than on the same page or face-to-face.
By the time Latino students have reached high school, and
the education system has worked its acculturation magic, most
of them read English very well, and thus our young adult books
are published primarily in English originals. On occasion we
address the immigrant high school population with a Spanishlanguage
original—of course, preceded by a separate Englishlanguage
translation that has had the benefit of being reviewed
by librarians and educators.
As you can see, the diversity of translation options is
not only dictated by market conditions but also by the social
and educational function that the texts must serve. Although
seemingly complicated to an outside observer, our practices are
culturally and linguistically based; moreover, despite our books’
cultural specificity, they have won numerous awards from the
world at large as well as from Latino critics and judges.
Nicolás Kanellos is the director of Arte Público Press (a recipient of NEA
grants) of the University of Houston, where he has been a professor since
1980. He has published numerous books on Hispanic literature and theater.
The Art of Empathy: Celebrating Literature in Translation
49