Clara Schulmann

Translated from the French by Naima Rashid, Natasha Lehrer, Lauren Elkin, Ruth Diver, Jessica Spivey, Jennifer Higgins, Clem Clement and Sophie Lewis.

Publication date: 8 March 2023

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As she tries to collect them for an essay she is planning to write, other women’s words begin interfering in Clara Schulmann’s life — heard on the radio, in podcasts, songs, and films; words of novelists, feminist intellectuals, friends or strangers overheard in the street. They invade her psyche, reshaping the essay that she once had in mind into a picaresque adventure which investigates the fault lines around women’s voices: and in particular those moments of overflow and excess where wayward words take seed.

Chicanes heralds a new French feminism through a meticulously orchestrated chorus of the wildest female voices, from figures in the history of feminist writing to the stranger on the street, blurring the boundaries between body and art; personal and political. A poly-translation, by eight female translators, from established to emerging, Chicanes brings the individual voice of each translator into subtle relief.

‘This is a book to treasure and love.’ — Deborah Levy

‘In this beautiful and original book, Clara Schulmann has assembled a dazzling ‘cacophony’, varying in rhythm, rapidity, hesitation and flow, from a wide range of fascinating and unexpected sources. Chicanes captures the sounds of women’s emotions; the perfectly expressed, the overflow of excess and the lapse into silence. Schulmann’s own voice is a vivid presence, inspiring readers, as they discover the words of other women who enliven her pages, to summon up their own treasured voices.’ — Laura Mulvey

Paperback with lilac endpapers
198 x 129mm, 210 pages
ISBN 978-1-7397783-2-3

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