The White Review No. 24 features a roundtable on the subject of translation. Our participants – Khairani Barokka, Rahul Bery, Kate Briggs and Jakob Stourgaard–Nielsen – discuss ‘fluency as power’, language extinction and oral cultures, and making mistakes. A theme repeatedly returned to is the collaborative nature of translation; as if to show the theory in practice, Adam Thirlwell’s essay/journal offers an account of his process of translating a poem by his friend Alejandro Zambra. We present this in conjunction with Zambra’s poem, forming a moving meditation on the misunderstandings that characterise human relationships.

We’re thrilled to publish the record of the poet Mary Ruefle’s year–long correspondence with our online editor Cecilia Tricker, which ranges over writing rituals, childhood and invisibility, an interview with German novelist Jenny Erpenbeck, and an unsettling story by the Man Booker International-shortlisted Argentine writer Ariana Harwicz, translated by Annie McDermott and Carolina Orloff.

We’re delighted to present debut fiction by Zakia Uddin, an extract from a new novel by Egyptian writer Nael Eltoukhy, translated by Robin Moger, and Rebecca Tamás’s essay ‘The Song of Hecate’ alongside series of artworks by Renate Berltmann and Sanya Kantarovksy. We feature new poetry by Heather Christle, NJ Stallard, and Karen McCarthy Woolf.

The cover is designed by the artist Anthea Hamilton, who is also interviewed in this issue.