On March 5th, we held the second live talk on the Japanese translation of “Healing the Enemy”. This time, too, the event was held at the café Riyo, where we had 12 people joining the talk for quality time.

We looked into the story by considering the historical and psychological background of Iraq and Iraqi people.

Live talks are truly precious opportunity, as I receive the meaningful questions from the participants. Each question helps me to see the story from different aspects and to make me understand it better. Among the questions I received at the last talk, there was one that was especially interesting to me: “Why did you transform the original title into passive?” (Japanese title “At the time the villain to be healed” as inversely translated.)To this question, I only gave the fact “This was the words that came up into my mind while I was translating the book”. However, while I was analyzing the story to prepare for the second talk, I realized why I chose such translation.

I would like to write about the reason for another time. When I conceived this title, I felt it just right and never thought of other possibilities. But thinking back now about the meaning of this book, it was the best title in Japanese. It is so interesting and amazing that I might have unconsciously received the message in the course of translation.