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Gallery of John Cullen
University of Texas, Austin, TX 78712, United States
The University of Texas at Austin where John Cullen received his Doctor of Philosophy degree.
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University of Texas, Austin, TX 78712, United States
The University of Texas at Austin where John Cullen received his Doctor of Philosophy degree.
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book
Follow Your Heart
(An international bestseller with tremendous word-of-mouth...)
An international bestseller with tremendous word-of-mouth appeal, Follow Your Heart is a bittersweet, heartwarming novel spanning generations and teaching the universal truths about life, love, and what lies within each of us. It begins in late autumn 1992 as an elderly Italian woman, prompted by the knowledge of her encroaching death, sits down to write a letter to her granddaughter now grown and living in far-off America. Through these moving reflections, we see one life laid bare - joys, sorrows, regrets, and all. And through the eyes of a woman nearing the end of her days, we come to understand what life experience has taught her: that no matter what the stakes, we must look within ourselves and gather the courage to follow our hearts.
https://www.amazon.com/Follow-Your-Heart-Susanna-Tamaro/dp/0385316577
1995
Medea
(Medea is among the most notorious women in the canon of G...)
Medea is among the most notorious women in the canon of Greek tragedy: a scorned woman who sacrifices her own children to her jealous rage. In her gripping new novel, Christa Wolf explodes this myth, revealing a fiercely independent woman ensnared in a brutal political battle.
https://www.amazon.com/Medea-Christa-Wolf/dp/0385490607
1996
The Left Hand of God: A Biography of the Holy Spirit
(Adolf Holl's divine biography examines the life of the Ho...)
Adolf Holl's divine biography examines the life of the Holy Spirit in the context of the history of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Interweaving scholarship with religion, myth, and culture, Holl expertly traces the influence of the Holy Spirit on men and women from all walks of life, over the course of centuries.
https://www.amazon.com/Left-Hand-God-Biography-Spirit/dp/0385492855
1998
The Phoenix: A Novel About the Hindenberg
(The year is 1947, ten years after the famous zeppelin Hin...)
The year is 1947, ten years after the famous zeppelin Hindenburg burst spectacularly into flames while landing in Lakehurst, New Jersey. The cause of the disaster is still a mystery. The airship was a symbol of world peace and German technological prowess and was carrying important American industrialists and high-ranking Nazi officers. The reasons to think the crash was something other than a horrible accident are manifold and contradictory. Birger Lund, a survivor, suspects sabotage.
https://www.amazon.com/Phoenix-Novel-About-Hindenberg/dp/0385501838
2000
Rispondimi
(In Rispondimi, Susanna Tamaro has written three beautiful...)
In Rispondimi, Susanna Tamaro has written three beautiful, thematically related novellas set in contemporary Italy. They portray lives shaped by the tyranny of family, the unpredictable consequences of love, and the fragile hope of redemption: a young woman, trapped by circumstance, teeters on the brink of an abyss; a middle-aged widow, consumed by her hatred of her dead husband, glimpses a possibility of salvation; a guilty father seeks renewal in his daughter's forgiveness.
https://www.amazon.com/Rispondimi-Susanna-Tamaro/dp/0385503512
2001
Villard: The Life and Times of an American Titan
(In their well-crafted biography, Alexandra Villard de Bor...)
In their well-crafted biography, Alexandra Villard de Borchgrave and John Cullen lovingly recount the meteoritic rise of one of the nineteenth century's most unsung business titans, Henry Villard. His investment in Edison's electrical enterprises paved the way for Villard to mastermind the consolidation of what is now known as the General Electric Company.
https://www.amazon.com/Villard-Life-Times-American-Titan-ebook/dp/B07TLWZX9K/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
2001
The Swallows of Kabul
(Set in Kabul under the rule of the Taliban, this extraord...)
Set in Kabul under the rule of the Taliban, this extraordinary novel takes readers into the lives of two couples: Mohsen, who comes from a family of wealthy shopkeepers whom the Taliban has destroyed; Zunaira, his wife, exceedingly beautiful, who was once a brilliant teacher and is now no longer allowed to leave her home without an escort or covering her face. Intersecting their world is Atiq, a prison keeper, a man who has sincerely adopted the Taliban ideology and struggles to keep his faith, and his wife, Musarrat, who once rescued Atiq and is now dying of sickness and despair.
https://www.amazon.com/Swallows-Kabul-Yasmina-Khadra/dp/1400033764
2004
Don't Move
(Called to the hospital when his fifteen-year-old daughter...)
Called to the hospital when his fifteen-year-old daughter, Angela, is injured in a potentially fatal accident, a prominent surgeon sits and waits, silently confessing the affair he had the year Angela was born. As Timoteo's tale begins, he's driving to the beach house where his beautiful, accomplished wife, Elsa, is waiting. Car trouble forces him to make a detour into a dingy suburb, where he meets Italia - unattractive, unpolished, working-class - who awakens a part of him he scarcely recognizes. Disenchanted with his stable life, he seizes the chance to act without consequences, and their savage first encounter spirals into an inexplicable obsession. Returning again and again to Italia's dim hovel, he finds himself faced with a choice: a life of passion with Italia, or a life of comfort and predictability with Elsa. As Angela's life hangs in the balance, Timoteo's own life flashes before his eyes, this time seen through the lens of the one time he truly lived.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0012D1DHS/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1
2004
Brodeck
(After the close of a great war, a mysterious stranger arr...)
After the close of a great war, a mysterious stranger arrives in a small European village. He is an artist and he begins sketching the villagers, showing the painful reality of the crimes and betrayals the war left in its wake. Consumed by distrust, the villagers conspire and murder him. The authorities commission Brodeck, a timid, low-level bureaucrat, to write a report that essentially whitewashes the incident. Brodeck agrees to write the official account, but he simultaneously sets down his version of the incident in a parallel narrative, which interweaves his own horrific experiences as a prisoner of war, the truth about the stranger’s disappearance, and the dark secrets the villagers have fought fiercely to keep hidden.
https://www.amazon.com/Brodeck-Philippe-Claudel/dp/0307390756/ref=sr_1_13?dchild=1&qid=1606830130&refinements=p_27%3AJohn+Cullen&s=books&sr=1-13&text=John+Cullen
2007
The Sirens of Baghdad
(A young Iraqi student, unable to attend college because o...)
A young Iraqi student, unable to attend college because of the war, sees American soldiers leave a trail of humiliation and grief in his small village. Bent on revenge, he flees to the chaotic streets of Baghdad where insurgents soon realize they can make use of his anger. Eventually, he is groomed for a secret terrorist mission meant to dwarf the attacks of September 11th, only to find himself struggling with moral qualms. The Sirens of Baghdad is a powerful look at the effects of violence on ordinary people, showing what can turn a decent human being into a weapon, and how the good in human nature can resist.
https://www.amazon.com/Sirens-Baghdad-Yasmina-Khadra/dp/0307386163/ref=sr_1_12?dchild=1&qid=1606829983&refinements=p_27%3AJohn+Cullen&s=books&sr=1-12&text=John+Cullen
2008
The Meursault Investigation
(He was the brother of "the Arab" killed by the infamous M...)
He was the brother of "the Arab" killed by the infamous Meursault, the antihero of Camus's classic novel. Seventy years after that event, Harun, who has lived since childhood in the shadow of his sibling's memory, refuses to let him remain anonymous: he gives his brother a story and a name - Musa - and describes the events that led to Musa's casual murder on a dazzlingly sunny beach.
https://www.amazon.com/Meursault-Investigation-Kamel-Daoud/dp/1590517512
2015
The Exchange of Princesses
(Set in the French and Spanish courts of the eighteenth ce...)
Set in the French and Spanish courts of the eighteenth century, this novel is based on a true story about the fate of two young princesses caught in the intrigues and secrets of the moment. Philippe d'Orléans, the regent of France, has a gangrenous heart - the result of a life of debauchery, alcohol, power, and flattery. One morning in 1721, he decides to marry eleven-year-old Louis XV to the daughter of Philippe V of Spain, who is only four. Orléans hopes this will tie his kingdom to Spain. But were Louis to die without begetting an heir - the likeliness of which is greatly increased by having a child bride - Orléans himself would finally be king.
https://www.amazon.com/Exchange-Princesses-Chantal-Thomas/dp/1590517024
2015
Blitz
(Blitz is a romantic tragicomedy that recounts the exploit...)
Blitz is a romantic tragicomedy that recounts the exploits of Beto, a young architect who heads to Munich with his girlfriend to take part in a landscape-planning competition. In an instant, a text message Beto wasn't meant to receive shatters him, leaving him bewildered and heading nowhere. But unintentionally he falls into the arms of Helga, an older woman, in a cross-generational encounter that is the heart of the tale.
https://www.amazon.com/Blitz-David-Trueba/dp/1590517849
2015
Decompression
(In this riveting tale, we meet two couples caught in a we...)
In this riveting tale, we meet two couples caught in a web of conflicting passions, diving instructor Sven Fiedler and his girlfriend, Antje, who live and work on the Spanish island of Lanzarote. When a tourist couple - Jola, a soap opera actress, and Theo, a stalled novelist - arrive for an intensive two-week diving experience, Sven is captivated by Jola's beauty and evident wealth. Theo suspects that Sven and Jola have begun an affair, but oddly, he seems to encourage them. Antje looks on, increasingly wary of these new clients. Cycling through different points of view, we are constantly kept guessing about who knows what - and who is telling the truth. A brutal game of temptation and manipulation unfolds, pointing toward a violent end - but a quiet one, underwater, beneath the waves.
https://www.amazon.com/Decompression-Juli-Zeh/dp/110191050X
2015
Villa Triste
(This novel by Patrick Modiano is one of the most seductiv...)
This novel by Patrick Modiano is one of the most seductive and accessible in his oeuvre: the story of a man's memories of fleeing responsibility, finding love, and searching for meaning in an uncertain world. The narrator of Villa Triste, an anxious, roving, stateless young man of eighteen, arrives in a small French lakeside town near Switzerland in the early 1960s. He is fleeing the atmosphere of menace he feels around him and the fear that grips him. Fear of war? Of imminent catastrophe? Of others?
https://www.amazon.com/Villa-Triste-Patrick-Modiano/dp/1590517679
2016
Supernotes
(In the Cambodian hinterlands, a lone Western prisoner suf...)
In the Cambodian hinterlands, a lone Western prisoner suffers through a hot, muddy, interminable sentence. Wasted by repeated torture, lack of sleep, malnutrition, and psychotropic drugs, he has been abandoned. His years of exemplary service to his government mean nothing. No one is coming for him. This is Agent Kasper, a man with a staggering résumé: commercial airline pilot, firearms expert, a highly accomplished practitioner of several of the martial arts, a secret agent par excellence. It is this incredible competence that will be his undoing.
https://www.amazon.com/Supernotes-Thriller-Agent-Kasper/dp/0385540078
2016
Khalil
(Khalil is a gripping first-person narrative about one you...)
Khalil is a gripping first-person narrative about one young man's involvement in France's worst terrorist attack. Khalil, a twenty-three-year-old Belgian of Moroccan descent, plans to detonate a suicide vest in a crowd outside the Stade de France on November 13, 2015. Explosions are rocking Paris, at cafés and the Bataclan theater, and when other bombs drive the stadium crowd to flee in his direction, near the Metro, his time has come. He presses his button and nothing. Fearing he has failed in his mission for Fraternal Solidarity (FS), an ISIS affiliate, Khalil has little choice but to blend in with his would-be victims and run.
https://www.amazon.com/Khalil-Novel-Yasmina-Khadra/dp/0385545916
2021
John Cullen
Edit ProfileEducation
John Cullen attended the University of Texas at Austin and received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in English literature there.
Career
John Cullen, from the beginning of his career, translated a number of books into English. Also, he has served as a coauthor. Cullen's first work as a translator was published in 1994. Written by Susanna Tamaro, Follow Your Heart is an epistolary novel that tells the story of an old Italian widow and her estranged granddaughter living in America. Cullen's next translated work is Adolf Holl's The Left Hand of God: A Biography of the Holy Spirit. Holl charts the role of the Holy Spirit from the New Testament all the way up through the works of Friedrich Nietzsche. Another Italian book that Cullen translated is Christa Wolf's Medea: A Modern Retelling. In this work, Wolf takes a mythological character generally looked down upon and shows her as a complex, compassionate and courageous feminist heroine.
Cullen's next translation is Henning Boetius's The Phoenix: A Novel about the Hindenburg. This work, written by the son of a Hindenburg survivor, is a fictional story of a man reported dead after the crash of the Hindenburg. He takes on a new identity and becomes obsessed with answering the question of what went wrong. Cullen translated another novel written by Susanna Tamaro, Rispondimi. The book is three novellas set in Italy and connected by spiritual and religious themes of good and evil, love and redemption.
Cullen's first work as a co-author is Villard: The Life and Times of an American Titan, written with Henry Villard's great-granddaughter, Alexandra Villard de Borchgrave. Villard was a railroad titan during the height of the Gilded Age and this biography follows his life from meager beginnings as a German immigrant, to his work as a journalist covering the Lincoln-Douglass debates, and his eventual success as a newspaperman, owner of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and aid to Thomas Edison and the founding of General Electric.
His most recent translations include Kamel Daoud's The Meursault Investigation, Patrick Modiano's Villa Triste, Chantal Thomas' The Exchange of Princesses, David Trueba's Blitz, Juli Zeh's Decompression, Luigi Carletti's Supernotes, and upcoming Yasmina Khadra's Khalil: A Novel (2021).
Achievements
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John Cullen is a widely known and gifted translator of novels from French, Italian, German, and Spanish. His work received a warm reception and was praised. His translations of Margaret Mazzantini's Don't Move and Yasmina Khadra's The Swallows of Kabul were shortlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. In 2010, his translation of Philippe Claudel's Brodeck won both the French-American Foundation Translation Prize and the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize.
The book, Villard: The Life and Times of an American Titan, which Cullen co-authored with Alexandra de Borchgrave, received very positive reviews.
Works
book
-
The Swallows of Kabul
(Set in Kabul under the rule of the Taliban, this extraord...)
2004 -
Follow Your Heart
(An international bestseller with tremendous word-of-mouth...)
1995 -
Don't Move
(Called to the hospital when his fifteen-year-old daughter...)
2004 -
Villa Triste
(This novel by Patrick Modiano is one of the most seductiv...)
2016 -
Villard: The Life and Times of an American Titan
(In their well-crafted biography, Alexandra Villard de Bor...)
2001 -
Decompression
(In this riveting tale, we meet two couples caught in a we...)
2015 -
The Exchange of Princesses
(Set in the French and Spanish courts of the eighteenth ce...)
2015 -
Blitz
(Blitz is a romantic tragicomedy that recounts the exploit...)
2015 -
The Sirens of Baghdad
(A young Iraqi student, unable to attend college because o...)
2008 -
Medea
(Medea is among the most notorious women in the canon of G...)
1996 -
The Phoenix: A Novel About the Hindenberg
(The year is 1947, ten years after the famous zeppelin Hin...)
2000 -
The Left Hand of God: A Biography of the Holy Spirit
(Adolf Holl's divine biography examines the life of the Ho...)
1998 -
Rispondimi
(In Rispondimi, Susanna Tamaro has written three beautiful...)
2001 -
Khalil
(Khalil is a gripping first-person narrative about one you...)
2021 -
Supernotes
(In the Cambodian hinterlands, a lone Western prisoner suf...)
2016 -
The Meursault Investigation
(He was the brother of "the Arab" killed by the infamous M...)
2015 -
Brodeck
(After the close of a great war, a mysterious stranger arr...)
2007
-
The Swallows of Kabul
Views
For John Cullen, his first few paragraphs are the most important and the most difficult. Just like the writers whose work he translates, he agonizes over finding the right words.
Connections
John Cullen is married to Valerie Martin.
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Born
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Nationality
United States