Written by Sally Gillis

Recently, my cousin in New York recommended a book to me that had absorbed her so fully that she completely missed her subway stop on her way home from work. “It’s called As God Commands,” she told me, “written by Niccolo Ammaniti and translated by Jonathan Hunt.” As her literary taste had never disappointed me in the past, I went in pursuit of the book. An online search of the Toronto Public Library yielded Come Dio Comanda, the original Italian version, but nothing in English. Local bookstores? Nothing by that name, in any language. Had I not decided to browse the “A” aisle and see what other books by Ammaniti were there, I would not have discovered that the book I was looking for was indeed in stock, multiple copies in fact, published as The Crossroads. Crossroads! Whatever had that to do with the original title? Who chose it? And why? Not the translator (because it had already been published elsewhere in English under the original name), and clearly not the author.

Stieg Larsson’s posthumously published Millenium series was the subject of an article in the New York Times Magazine of May 23, which contained these interesting tidbits: The first installment of the trilogy, the one you have probably seen in every bookstore window as The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, was published in the original Swedish as (I’ll spare you the Swedish and trust the New York Times editorial department on the translation) Men Who Hate Women. In France, the title is Men Who Didn’t Love Women, and unless not loving women is considered the equivalent of hate in France, it would seem that these three titles refer to three very different books.

Interestingly, according to the article, Larsson’s Swedish editor is reported to have said that although the editing of the first novel went smoothly, “the one thing Larsson wouldn’t budge on was the unsexy title, Men who Hate Women.” I wonder what he would have thought of the North American title! The eagerly anticipated third volume of the trilogy has just appeared on American bookshelves as The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest; in England it has been available for a few months as The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest. Not having read the book, I have no idea how many hornets, metaphorical or otherwise, are involved…but either there is one, or more than one; you can’t have it both ways!

Those of you who have read the Bookclub-in-a-Box guide to Lawrence Hill’s The Book of Negroes (Canadian title)/Someone Knows My Name (American title), are aware of how a book can change identity beginning with its “label”, or name. In the case of Hill’s novel, the word “negroes” was deemed to be politically incorrect, despite the fact that the title refers to a legitimate historical document which can be seen both at the National Archives at Washington and in Britain’s National Archives – and which is called…yes indeed…The Book of Negroes. The political and social implications of this name change make for an interesting discussion. While it is definitely related to the novel, it was never part of the author’s original intent.

The title of a book often provides a window into a writer’s objectives, but it can also point to any number of different discussion directions. This is especially true of books that have been translated. It is always interesting to consider the title’s origin and reinvention in relation to censorship, marketing, fear, political correctness or other reason.

If you come across an interesting change of title that has been discussed in your group, please share your thoughts with us.