The Pulitzer Prize-winning The Road, a story first published in 2006 of a father and son who travel through a post-apocalyptic world, was translated by Benedek Totth. Totth, discussed the translation with chief editor Bence Sárközy and the writer András Cserna-Szabó at a recent even at the National Foreign Languages Library.
Totth said he had immersed himself in McCarthy's works to get an idea of his rhythm. The author's usual "swell" of words is not as pronounced in his latest novel; the style is far simpler than in No Country For Old Men, he said.
András Cserna-Szabó, Bence Sárközy and Benedek Tóth
Sárközy said many critics had compared the book to Beckett's Waiting for Godot and acknowledged the similarities. The book does not deal with what caused the catastrophe that brought on such apocalyptic conditions, rather it focuses on "what remains of humanity after such a cataclysm".
The Road could be seen as the second part of a trilogy, with No Country For Old Men the first part, said Cserna-Szabó. The first part of the trilogy shows a world on the brink of apocalypse, he added.
Cserna-Szabó said he didn't like the novel, and even thought it shabby, but only later did he realise that he could not get it out of his head for weeks. The book is as separate from literature as a mystical text or a sacred writing, he added.
