The Portuguese-language novel Mau Tempo no Canal, published in 1944, is a novel set in the Azores between 1917–1919. It tells the story of a member of a noble yet financially declining family and her struggles with the secular fatalism of her culture as she anxiously attempts to overcome it.

In 1998, Francisco Cota Fagundes translated the novel into English and retitled it Stormy Isles: An Azorean Tale. Attendees joined Francisco as he shared the story and explored the relationship between the U.S. and the Azores. He discussed the role that American literature played in the novel, as well as the theory and practice of translation (known as traductology). The book’s original writing included the use of several foreign languages (known as heterolingualism), from Latin to French to Spanish, as well as unique whaling terminology.  Francisco talked about the challenges he faced during the translation process and how he navigated them.

Francisco Cota Fagundes, Professor of Portuguese (Emeritus) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has authored, edited and co-edited, translated and co-translated more than thirty books. Translator and creative writer, he has translated from English to Portuguese and from Portuguese into English.  Francisco was born in Agualva, Terceira, Azores, and emigrated to the United States in 1963. He spent three and a half years milking cows in the San Joaquin Valley, California. Having completed the fourth grade in his native country and never having attended a secondary school either in Portugal or the U.S., Francisco Fagundes attended Los Angeles Valley Junior College (1967-1970; magna cum laude), the University of California, Los Angeles where he earned a double B. A. (1972: summa cum laude), an M.A. in Luso-Brazilian Studies (1973) and a Ph.D. in Hispanic Languages and Literatures (1976).

View the presentation on the museum’s YouTube channel HERE.