Puns, poetry and pence per word — the secrets of literary translators
As a literary translator myself (from Portuguese, Spanish and French), I've been gratified over this past decade to watch the prize's growing impact, not only spotlighting a dozen interesting books a year, but also helping to raise the profile of literary translators and the work we do. Still, literary translation remains more mysterious than I would like. So here are some things I wish people
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Daily Mail
3 hours ago
- Daily Mail
I've been a fixer for some of Britain's biggest TV shows... Jeremy Clarkson threw a tantrum while filming Top Gear - so the crew got their revenge
A fixer used by top TV stars has lifted the lid on stars' furious off-screen rows, near-fatal crashes, 'demanding' antics and how viewers were tricked with faked scenes made to look dangerous. Digby Greenhalgh, co-owner of Explore Indochina, has guided stars including Jeremy Clarkson, Gordon Ramsay and Bear Grylls on motorcycle trips in South East Asia. Now he has opened up about his own experiences - including witnessing Clarkson flying into a vicious foul-mouthed tirade and spitting at a colleague. The row happened during filming for the Top Gear Vietnam special in October 2008 - seven years before he was sacked by the BBC for punching a colleague. In a blog post, Mr Greenhalgh, described the moment the presenter confronted executive producer and longtime friend Andy Wilman in a hotel foyer filming at a beach club finished for the day and they returned to the hotel without him. He wrote: 'In the confusion, understandable at the end of such a long and tiring day, Jeremy was left behind and mobbed by the tourists. 'He had trouble finding the hotel, and when he finally returned, it was just him, myself and Andy [Wilman] in the hotel's foyer. 'He was pissed off and went straight up to Andy and shouted, 'You care more about the crew than me. I'm out of here, you c***'. 'Then Jeremy spat in Andy's direction and stormed into the elevator. Andy was stunned and turned to me and said he'd been Jeremy's best man twice. 'It had been an extremely long day.' The Top Gear Vietnam special which aired in December 2008 saw Clarkson and co stars Richard Hammond and James May, travelling 1,000 miles across the country in eight days and proved a huge hit with fans with 6.7 million viewers tuning in. Explore Indochina provided further assistance with them during filming and Digby revealed the back wheel nearly fell off Clarkson's Vespa moped but the BBC refused to spend more than $400 on a safer but more expensive alternative. Digby - who carried the lead cameraman on the back of his bike - also revealed the crew became so sick of Clarkson's outbursts they wouldn't fix a short circuit on his Vespa moped so he was repeatedly electrocuted. He added: 'At one point, the director asked Jeremy to repeat what he'd just said, but while looking at the camera. Jeremy said 'Since when do you do the talking? This is Top Gear, and I do the talking'. 'The Vespa started to give Jeremy electrical shocks, and we all smiled behind his back. One of the crew members said he could probably fix it, but it was decided that he should just let him suffer.' In 2009 Digby joined the crew filming Bear Grylls' Man vs Wild show in the Khe Bang-Phong Nha National Park - and revealed the adventurer slept one night in a cave before secretly checking into a hotel that had to be booked out so nobody got a photo of him relaxing by the pool. He also accused the ex-SAS trooper of faking other scenes including filming wilderness scenes right next to the road, hidden safety wires during river crossings and an 'encounter' with a cobra bought from a local snake restaurant and tied to a tree. He wrote: 'All these [filming] spots had to be no more than a 20-minute walk from a road, and, ideally, right next to the road. 'Next time you watch the show, notice how he's always running around, giving the impression that he is covering lots of ground. In reality, he just runs around in circles. 'The whole snake in a national park issue was solved by buying a massive cobra in a snake restaurant outside the park and then tying it to a tree. Bear comes across it, says some BS about it being a spitting cobra, and goes around it.' He was also employed by the BBC for an episode of Most Dangerous Roads in which Sue Perkins and Liza Tarbuck drove the Ho Chi Minh Trail. He wrote: 'I was hired as the Trail guide and expert but spent most of my time keeping the presenters happy. 'The pair were rather demanding, and accommodation on the Trail in those days was rough, so one of my jobs was to ride ahead of Perkins and Tarbuck and ensure their rooms were presentable. 'That meant splashing bleach on the floor and bathrooms to eliminate unpleasant odours, laying out fresh, clean, disposable sheets, and sweeping up any nasty surprises.' On another BBC show - Without Limits - he claims the shoot almost ended in tragedy when a modified jeep blew a gasket, lost steering and crashed while the brake disk on a disabled presenter's modified bike broke off. He wrote: 'The shoot occurred during the middle of a scorching summer, which, apart from making it very uncomfortable for the presenters, almost resulted in a terrible crash when the jeep overheated and blew a gasket. 'The loss of hydraulics disengaged the steering wheel, and the jeep hit the roadside barrier. Only three kilometres down the road was an extremely steep descent above a very high cliff, which would have been fatal if the gasket had blown there. 'On the same pass, the back disk brake on one of the presenter's bikes broke off, and he was lucky to escape unscathed. In both cases, the root cause of the problem was the rushed schedule imposed on us to get the vehicles and motorcycles ready for the shoot.' Digby also filmed with Gordon Ramsay when he travelled to Vietnam to learn how to prepare famous local dishes for Gordon's Great Escape. He revealed the show's legal department decided the TV chef was 'too valuable' to ride on any public road and could only go around in circles on a closed-off cement road. But as soon as he got out of sight of the director Gordon, 58, gunned his 650cc Ural bike through traffic and past a police road block. He wrote: 'Gordon's off-camera demeanour was very different to his trademark grumpy persona. Polite and professional, he was a pleasure to work with.'
The Guardian
6 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘This vertical city is so dense, the only way to build is up': Victor Cheng's best phone picture
Victor Cheng describes his adopted city as 'organised chaos'. The photographer, originally from Toronto but now based in Hong Kong, says that while many people have a stereotypical view of the city, based on classic kung fu movies or Rush Hour, it's 'actually quite modern, and full of skyscrapers. It's also fast-paced; even at times when you have nowhere to be, you get caught up in the busy streets and start to feel you have to move faster!' Despite that, Cheng says he sees the city as a 'photographer's paradise. There are so many photogenic spots and scenes.' The Yick Cheong building seen here, known colloquially as Monster Building or Monster Mansion, is usually teeming with locals and tourists. When Cheng took this shot, however, the Covid lockdown was in force. Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion 'I think it gained its nickname after it was in a Transformers movie,' he says. 'It's a residential building, but downstairs there are shops, cafes and wet markets. Because of the pandemic, it felt like I had the place to myself. I set a timer, put the phone down and used the wide-angle lens to get the shot.' Cheng later applied minor adjustments using the Lightroom app. 'I hope that people would be amazed at how dense this vertical city is,' Cheng says. 'Space is so limited that the only way to build is up.'
The Review Geek
21 hours ago
- The Review Geek
The Nice Guy – K-drama Episode 6 Recap & Review
Episode 6 Episode 6 of The Nice Guy begins with Chang-soo growing impatient about the attack on Tae-hoon that he had planned. Elsewhere, Tae-hoon visits his sister's resting place at the columbarium, and we see how close the siblings were before her death. Meanwhile, Mi-young has taken a job teaching people how to play the piano, now that she's gotten over her past trauma. Elsewhere, since Seok-kyung has been missing her son, Seok-cheol takes the mother and son to an amusement park, along with his friend Byeon-soo, who has very clearly expressed interest in Seok-kyung. After a fun day, the mother and son part ways sadly, with Seok-kyung making empty promises to her son about returning to live with him. Meanwhile, Seok-hee suspects that Ki-hong is cheating on her and follows him. She sees him together with a woman but reluctantly leaves after being thrown out of the art hall for not having a ticket. After the show ends, Ki-hong tells the woman the truth – that he has a girlfriend, and takes his leave, while Seok-hee turns down a patient who had shown interest in her. All the while, Tae-hoon tries to provoke Chang-soo by targeting one of the bars on his turf. Seok-cheol smooths things over and then helps a fellow gangster who has agreed to kill Tae-hoon for Chang-soo. In the meantime, Mi-young receives an offer from an entertainment company to debut as a singer-songwriter, but not before the episode hints at Tae-hoon's involvement in the offer. Parallelly, Seok-cheol is stressed over saving his parents' house, just as his father prepares for the bank to take over and signs a lease for a small apartment. Because he refused to kill Tae-hoon, Seok-cheol is unable to raise the money. While heading home, he meets the leader of the neighborhood resistance, whose life he had previously saved. While talking, the protest leader advises him to leave his gangster job and focus on his family, who matters most to people like them. Later, as Seok-cheol goes to meet Mi-young, he finds Tae-hoon already there. Tae-hoon threatens Mi-young by promising to mess with Seok-cheol when she refuses to have anything to do with him, as the episode ends. The Episode Review This is another straightforward and average episode in The Nice Guy's repertoire. Unlike the previous episodes, though, this one highlights a subtle theme running beneath the surface of the show: family. Set in a gangster universe, the idea of family, amidst betrayal, violence, and instability, adds much-needed nuance and warmth to the episode. However, while these moments bring the characters together under a shared familial theme, the individual character arcs, relationships, and personalities still feel underdeveloped and lacking in depth. Previous Episode Next Episode Expect A Full Season Write-Up When This Season Concludes!
