They say that the translator of a book is often the book’s biggest fan. I can wholeheartedly attest to that. In fact, I’m afraid this note will look more like a love letter. Let me first have a bite of Calm Cookie to keep my dignity so I can add my two cents as a “dignified” translator, although I know I’ll utterly fail.
I immediately fell in love with the book as a reader when my sister introduced it to me (I owe you tons of dream payments, Hasun!) long before it became a million-copy bestseller in Korea. The world-building and the characters are so fantastical yet vividly real that I could immediately picture the novel becoming an animated adaptation. Miye Lee introduces the imaginative world effortlessly in a whimsical and palatable way to a wide readership, and it shows in the way she forms a sentence, sets a scene and tells a story that is both fun and deep. It is unpretentious yet full of life, which I wanted to carry into the translation.
I didn’t find it challenging to capture the voice because I felt completely in sync with Penny; I equally marveled at the wide variety of dreams, fangirled over the dream industry people and remain in awe of the technology behind dream payments. I connected so easily with Penny because she is such a relatable and adorable character, and in fact, these traits are shared across all the characters—not a single one is unlikable, and I can’t help but adore them. Lee’s tenderness toward her characters was something I kept in mind in the translation.
One of the fun parts of translating this novel was coming up with new words and rules for my anglophone audience. My favorite new word is dreammaker for dream director, echoing filmmaker. (Thanks, Hyeyoung!) The original novel uses a word for dream producer in literal translation, which doesn’t quite capture the creative mind of a director. As for the rules, I found it satisfying to use the present tense for the dream world and the past tense for the real world. It distinguishes between the two, but I also think the present tense conveys a fantastical nature of the dream world that transcends time and memory.
To close out my love letter, I wish for more sequels to see Penny grow and become a manager, and to meet more customers with unique stories that will warm many hearts yet again.
So that, in the end, she can finally hear Dallergut approve: “Now you have worked here long enough to understand how it’s done.”
With love,
Sandy Joosun Lee