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The translator's task is to create, in his or her own language, the same tensions appearing in the original. That's hard!

Human writing reflects that of the universe; it is its translation, but also its metaphor: it says something totally different, and it says the same thing.

I encourage the translators of my books to take as much license as they feel that they need. This is not quite the heroic gesture it might seem, because I've learned, from working with translators over the years, that the original novel is, in a way, a translation itself.

Writing reminds you of how much there is in your life that stands outside your explanations. In that way, it's almost a journey into faith and doubt at once.

The goal of Bible translation is be transparent to the original text - to see as clearly as possible what the biblical authors actually wrote.

The idea of the sacred is quite simply one of the most conservative notions in any culture, because it seeks to turn other ideas - uncertainty, progress, change - into crimes.

The same myths are told in every culture, and they might swap out details, but it's still the same story. It's the same story, but with a different face.

Yes, translation is by definition an inadequate substitute for being able to read a masterpiece in the original.

The road to the sacred leads through the secular.

Myths can't be translated as they did in their ancient soil. We can only find our own meaning in our own time.