"I recently finished translating the novel Abel by Alessandro Baricco, published in Italy in 2023. It is the fourth novel by Baricco that I have translated after Emmaus, Mr Gwyn, and The Young Bride. All his books were very successful in Romania, and he was twice invited to meet with his readers. In October 2016, he was awarded an honorary degree by the University of Cluj. In the laudation I wrote: «I confess that when I was asked to write this laudation for Alessandro Baricco, I thought for a moment and then I said to myself: why not? After all, I know most of his works very well, his books have been part of my life for almost five years: I have read them, re-read them and translated them. On second thought, however, I saw that I was wrong. I still had a lot to learn before truly knowing him, because Alessandro Baricco is not just a writer, he is a whole universe (with its music, philosophy, sense of humor, irony, energy; sometimes in love, sometimes sulky, or tender) and as such he is difficult to know. In his works, Baricco is in a state of constant transformation, much like the Black Sea, which is sometimes green, sometimes blue, sometimes brown, and sometimes grey. The beauty of his works lies in that changeability».
My opinion has not changed since, even after translating this latest book of his. Baricco constantly changes his writing. Each book is different. In this novel, subtitled A Metaphysical Western Story, the story of a gunman is told in a peculiar manner, blending literary genres and lacking a coherent timeline. Baricco manages to bring life to a strange and unique world, where the values of love, brotherhood, honour, and justice prevail, but Evil often dominates. A book about death and how to avoid it, and about life and how to live it. A book that arouses strong emotions and requires a lot of attention from the reader. And above all, from the translator.
Translating Abel was a real challenge for me, a proper Litmus test. After Ragazzi di vita by Pier Paolo Pasolini, it is undoubtedly the most difficult text I have ever translated, both for the multitude of expressions, at times almost hermetic, and for the vocabulary taken from the American western (such as, for example, the parts of a cowboy saddle). Other times, a syntax different from the Romanian one created problems for me. As I said earlier, Baricco’s books have always been very successful in Romania. I therefore hope that this next work of his, which should be released by May, will have the same lucky fate".