Interview Roundup

Thanks to Jessa at Bookslut for calling two new interviews to my attention. Edith Grossman, translator of Ecco's new edition of Don Quixote:

"Cervantes a feminist! It never occurred to me. I tend to doubt it - at least in any modern sense of the word. I think the issue is less a matter of "women seeking their own identity" and more a question of women disguising themselves as men to escape untenable situations, taking certain risks to claim the husbands who are rightfully and legally theirs, or, in one case, to convert to Christianity. Yet Cervantes seems to admire his strong, virtuous female characters, and by the same token, I don't think it is a coincidence that the cruel and sadistic duchess has ulcers on her legs."

And Whitbread Award-winning poet Don Paterson:

"Even now I get calls from people at the radio saying we're doing a wee feature and we know you love football. I wrote one poem that mentions football! These were the things I was thinking about at the time. And I was massively detained by sex and football... There's no point in saying I didn't invite it."

(Remember, when he says football, he means soccer!)