Megan McDowell on translation as an ongoing conversation

Welcome to It's Lit in Translation. The podcast that champions literature in translation and the people who make it possible.

In today's episode, we were joined by Megan McDowell, a highly acclaimed American literary translator known for bringing contemporary Latin American and Spanish literature to English audiences. She is best known for translating the works of the most important Latin American writers working today, including Alejandro Zambra, Samanta Schweblin, and Mariana Enriquez. 

We spoke about her journey into literary translation and her 'non-traditional' route into publishing, which ultimately led her into translation. Megan shared how she began to work with the Spanish language, spent some time in Chile, and how her first translation gig came about. Diving into how her relationship with translation has changed since then, Megan sheds light on the alternative ways one can get started as a literary translator.

Brenda Navarro’s Eating Ashes, published in 2025 by OneWorld, is her latest translation. We discussed the significance of not translating Spanish words in this translation as a signalling of isolation for the main character, alongside the symbolism behind the narrator's unnamed status. A novel that deals with racism and xenophobia that Latin American immigrants are exposed to within Europe, Megan highlights the importance of language to capture this experience.

Megan also takes us through her translation process, in which translation transcends working from one language into another and becomes a transformative act that captures the emotions and sentiment of the original in another language.

Lastly, we spoke about her role in translating the most important Latin American writers working today, from Alejandro Zambra and Samanta Schweblin to Mariana Enriquez, and how, for Megan, translation is never finished: there is never a 'right' or 'faithful' way to produce a text, when the craft itself is an ongoing conversation between writers, readers, cultures, literatures, and translators.

-

Eating Ashes by Brenda Navarro (published by OneWorld publications), translated from Spanish by Megan McDowell, is available to buy through here: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/it-s-lit-in-translation/

-

Music from #Uppbeat (free for Creators!):

https://uppbeat.io/t/el-depravo/tarnished-rose

Photo Credit: Megan McDowell