Translations
Christine is particularly interested in links with Nordic countries and minority languages of Europe. She has also taken part in several collaborative translation events. You can read her work with poets from Finland, Norway, Iceland and Wales in the poetry section of this site.
She translates her own mother-tongue poems into English to create a 'bridge' version for translators. This is augmented with notes, glosses and, wherever possible, discussion or correspondence.
Bi-lingual collections
Mither Tongue, Jidi Majia, Translated into Scots - via English translations by Denis Mair – by Christine De Luca, Stuart Paterson and Sheena Blackhall, ed Gerry Loose, Vagabond Voices, Glasgow
A bi-lingual in English, Northern Alchemy, was published by Patrician Press in Spring 2020.
2017 saw the publication of two bi-lingual "Selecteds": one in Icelandic - Heimferðir - Haemfarins, translations by Aðalsteinn Ásberg Sigurðsson, published by Dimma - and one in Norwegian Glimt av opphav - Glims o Origin, translations by Odd Goksøyr, published by Ura Forlag.
Following the successful launch of the bi-lingual version of Dat Trickster Sun (Questo sole furfante) in Sardinia in October 2015, Christine is currently working with her Italian translator, Professor Francesca Romana Paci, on some Edinburgh-themed poems written during her Makarship. The poems are responses to the work of the Italian-Scottish artist Sir Eduardo Paolozzi. The aim is to make his work more widely known in the land of his forbears.
The first full-length bi-lingual collection was however in French. She collaborated with translator Jean-Paul Blot of éditions fédérop who published the prize-winning Mondes Parallèles in 2007.
Anthologies
Perhaps the most unusual translation Christine has so far been asked to undertake is a long poem - The Enduring One - as part of a collection of poems by the Chinese poet Jidi Majia. He is of the Yi ethnic minority in China and is President of the China Minority Literary Association and Permanent Vice-President of the China Poets' Association. The Scottish coordinator of this project is the poet Gerry Loose, who had the joy of meeting the poet while in China. It will be a bi-lingual English- Scots version.
Christine visited Russia in September 2016, taking part in a series of mutual translation workshops, facilitated by the British Council in Russia, the Scottish Poetry Library, with additional financial support from the Edwin Morgan Trust. There were three Scottish poets and three Russian poets. A selection of the translations was published in the 2017 collection, Sonnets Exchange, by The British Council.
Christine made Shetlandic versions of some poems by the Palestinian poet Maya Abu Al-Hayyat (A Bird is not a Stone, Freight Books 2014).
In 2008 her translations of the work of contemporary Frisian poets were included in the publication Migraasje, edited by Eleanor Livingstone, published by Stravaigers in association with Happenstance.
A most fruitful collaboration was held in Shetland and involved poets from Iceland, Norway, Finland, Estonia and Latvia. The Scottish Poetry Library published a selection of the translations in All Points North (2006).
Earlier Italian translations can be found in Seguendo La Traccia; A Fabbri; W Morani and P Severini in 1997; and by Renzo Cremona.
In 1998 Szkocja - Polska contained a Polish version of Christine's poem, Lizzie Coutts' Knowe, and later, in 2004, a poem for Green Shoots issue 25; a special edition by Edinburgh City Libraries to mark the twinning of Edinburgh and Krakow. The City of Edinburgh Council, Culture and Leisure, 2004.
Literary Magazines
The journal Modern Poetry in Translation has twice published Christine's Shetlandic versions of poems by Nordic poets Arne Ruste (Norway) and Riina Katajavuori (Finland). She has also enjoyed taking part in their web-based translation workshops.
In 2009 the Turkish writer, Nesrin Eruysal included Christine in her list of poets translated.
Øystein Orten and Odd Goksøyr collaborated on an article and translated some of Christine's poems in the Norwegian literary magazine Bokvennen (nr 4;2010); and some poems of hers appeared in translation in the Finnish literary magazine Taite (1: 2006), translated by Riina Katajavuori.
Christine was commissioned to translate some of her Shetlandic poems for "The Online Magazine for International Literature", Words Without Borders, 2004.
Shetland (Christine & Robert Alan Jamieson) and Orkney (George MacKay Brown) featured in Transcript 2, February 2003. Transcript describes itself as the European internet review of books and writing. Reviews are available in English, German and French. Transcript aims to "promote quality literature written in the smaller languages and give wider circulation to material from small-language literary publications..."
Children's Storybooks
Christine is also involved in translating storybooks for children. Her most recent translation, Da Peerie Prince is a translation of Le Petit Prince, the French classic children's story by Antoine De Saint-Exupéry. It was published in 2022 by Edition Tintenfass.
In November 2016 Shetland translations of two of Julia Donaldson's story books were published by Black & White Publishing Ltd.: The Troll was transformed into Da Trow and The Gruffalo's Child into Da Gruffalo's Bairn. This follows her successful translation of George's Marvellous Medicine into Dodie's Phenomenal Pheesic, published by Hansel Cooperative Press in 2008.
Other Translations
2019 saw the culmination of a collaboration between Portuguese poets (Vitor Cardeira, Pedro Jubilot) and translators and Christine with Christie Williamson, another Shetland poet. The result was a bilingual performance Whisky Galore with music. She has also had some of her poems translated into Portuguese, collaborating with Ana Maria Maguire.
Christine also took part in a Translation Masterclass, hosted by the Scottish Poetry Library. She worked with the Slovenian poet, Tomaž Šalamun, turning basic English translations of his work into Shetlandic poems.