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Peter Bergsma

    Peter Bergsma is a distinguished literary translator with extensive experience. His work is characterized by precision and a deep understanding of the original authors' texts. Bergsma focuses on preserving the spirit and style of the source material during its transfer into a new language. His translations are valued for their fluency and faithfulness to the original, bringing world literature to readers.

    Can't and won't
    An Island
    Klara and The Sun
    Youth
    Boyhood. Der Junge, englische Ausgabe
    Waiting for the Barbarians
    • An Island

      • 185 pages
      • 7 hours of reading

      A young refugee washes up unconscious on the beach of a small island inhabited by no one but Samuel, an old lighthouse keeper. Unsettled, Samuel is soon swept up in memories of his former life on the mainland: a life that saw his country suffer, then fight for independence, only to fall to a cruel dictator; he recalls his own part in its history.

      An Island2023
      3.5
    • Klara and The Sun

      • 320 pages
      • 12 hours of reading

      *The #1 Sunday Times Bestseller* *Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2021* *A Barack Obama Summer Reading Pick* 'A delicate, haunting story' The Washington Post 'This is a novel for fans of Never Let Me Go . . . tender, touching and true.' The Times 'The Sun always has ways to reach us.' From her place in the store, Klara, an Artificial Friend with outstanding observational qualities, watches carefully the behaviour of those who come in to browse, and of those who pass in the street outside. She remains hopeful a customer will soon choose her, but when the possibility emerges that her circumstances may change for ever, Klara is warned not to invest too much in the promises of humans. In Klara and The Sun, Kazuo Ishiguro looks at our rapidly changing world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator to explore a fundamental question: what does it mean to love?

      Klara and The Sun2021
      3.7
    • Can't and won't

      • 304 pages
      • 11 hours of reading

      'Bloomington- Now that I have been here a while, I can say with confidence that I have never been here before.' 'Delightful, deeply moving, deliciously humorous, beautiful and surprising.' Financial Times'One of America's finest practitioners of prose . . . brimming with renewed inventiveness and the ability to assault readers with an upped dosage of wit, pathos and insight. Stunning, mesmerising.' Herald'A chance to revel . . . good, funny, remarkable.' Observer'Take these writings as they come, slowly. You will go back to a little gem that has wormed its way into your mind and stuck there, and discover that it is indeed a little gem, which sparkles a different way each time and flashes with a brief beauty of hidden meaning.' Susan Hill, Spectator'Davis can invest descriptions of everyday events with startling reserves of emotion. She has a brilliant eye for the surprising, vibrant detail.'Sunday Times'A clever and refreshing observation of the world around us.' Stylist'One of the unique creations of American literature.' Prospect

      Can't and won't2014
      3.4
    • Boyhood. Der Junge, englische Ausgabe

      • 162 pages
      • 6 hours of reading

      Boyhood is a deeply-felt and utterly compelling account of a South African childhood: the narrative style is as spare and lean as the Karoo flatlands which form its backdrop' Daily Telegraph

      Boyhood. Der Junge, englische Ausgabe2005
      3.8
    • Slow Man

      Slow Man: A Novel

      • 256 pages
      • 9 hours of reading

      After a life-altering cycling accident leads to the amputation of his leg, Paul Rayment grapples with complex emotions for his nurse and her attractive teenage son. His world is further disrupted by the unexpected visit of renowned Australian novelist Elizabeth Costello, who seeks to influence both his recovery and romantic entanglements. The interplay of personal struggles and external influences shapes a poignant narrative about love, loss, and the quest for direction in life.

      Slow Man2005
      3.5
    • Elizabeth Costello

      • 224 pages
      • 8 hours of reading

      Elizabeth Costello is an Australian writer of international renown. Famous principally for an early novel that established her reputation, she has reached the stage where her remaining function is to be venerated and applauded. Her life has become a series of engagements in sterile conference rooms throughout the world - a private consciousness obliged to reveal itself to a curious public: the presentation of a major award at an American college where she is required to deliver a lecture; a sojourn as the writer in residence on a cruise liner; a visit to her sister, a missionary in Africa, who is receiving an honorary degree, an occasion which both recognise as the final opportunity for effecting some form of reconciliation; and a disquieting appearance at a writers' conference in Amsterdam where she finds the subject of her talk unexpectedly amongst the audience. She has made her life's work the study of other people yet now it is she who is the object of scrutiny. But, for her, what matters is the continuing search for a means of articulating her vision and the verdict of future generations.

      Elizabeth Costello2002
      3.3
    • Youth

      • 169 pages
      • 6 hours of reading

      A searing portrait of a young colonial in early 1960s London – from the two-time winner of the Booker Prize. Set against the background of the 1960s - Sharpeville, the Cuban missile crisis, Vietnam – Youth is a remarkable portrait of a consciousness, isolated and adrift, turning in on itself. The narrator of Youth, a student in the South Africa of the 1950s, studies mathematics, reads poetry, saves money, trying to ensure that when he escapes to the real world, wherever that may be, he will be prepared to experience life to its full intensity and transform it into art. Arriving in London, however, he finds neither poetry nor romance. Instead he succumbs to the monotony of life as a computer programmer, from which random, loveless affairs offer no relief. Devoid of inspiration, he stops writing. An awkward colonial, a constitutional outsider, he begins a dark pilgrimage in which he is continually tested and continually found wanting.

      Youth2002
      3.8
    • Waiting for the Barbarians

      • 176 pages
      • 7 hours of reading

      A magistrate in a country village protests the army's treatment of members of the barbarian tribes taken prisoner during a civil war and finds himself arrested as a traitor.

      Waiting for the Barbarians2002
      4.0
    • IJzertijd

      • 191 pages
      • 7 hours of reading

      In een brief aan haar dochter beschrijft een oude, blanke vrouw uit Kaapstad de wreedheden van de Apartheid waarmee ze de laatste maanden van haar leven wordt geconfronteerd.

      IJzertijd2000
    • Less Than Zero

      • 208 pages
      • 8 hours of reading

      Clay comes home on break from his East Coast college to a landscape of limitless privilege and absolute moral entropy, where the natives drive Porsches, dine at Spago, and gobble their Quaaludes from Pez dispensers. Where else can Clay go but down? "A teenage slice-of-death novel, no holds barred".--VILLAGE VOICE. Copyright © Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.

      Less Than Zero1989
      3.5