Dear Lacemakers, Lena Dahren, who is Second Secretary of OIDFA, and is one of the Swedish representatives on the Council, has been informed of our lengthy correspondence about Sally Johanson. She has kindly sent information that owners of Ms. Johanson's book may wish to print and put in their books:
------------------------------------------------------------------ Dear Jeri, I have been told about the discussion about the book "Knyppling" written by Miss Sally Johanson, and which was translated to English in the 1960's. I write to you as I somehow have seen your name before, and you seemed to be interested in the discussion. Miss Johanson was my boss for many years, so I think I can talk for her in this case, and I do not mind if you will forward this to the lacemakers on Arachne. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Miss Sally Johanson started working for the bobbinlace renewal in Sweden in 1936. You must realise she worked out of the Swedish point of view, which is a very small "lace country" compared to England, Belgium, France, etc. but by the location in the far north, still having old traditions of freehandlace, etc. The book "Knyppling" is a development of the teaching/learners book "Handledning i knyppling" written 1940-1950. "Knyppling" written in 1963-4 was written for Swedish educational purposes. When I started working with Miss Johanson in 1976 the English translation was in the drawers of the persons who might need to correspond with English speaking people, but Miss Johanson was not happy with the translation. Why? I do not know, she never said. We were told it was a "bad translation". Miss Johanson was a person who never, ever showed off her knowledge. She would never ever say she was the best, or that her knowledge was of any kind better than anyone else. I would not say she was shy, but she never put herself in the frontline. The fact that she was elected as president of OIDFA, is that she was elected, not because of her own nomination - she would never have nominated herself. The text that I understand has been seen as insulting has to be the text of an editor or translator. Translation of books is a hazard, as it is not the original writers who do it, and as MIss Johanson did not speak any other language than Swedish, she could not read and check the text. The editor of a translated originally Swedish unknown book needs to shout out that this unknown author is worthy of reading. The fact that Miss Johanson never agreed with the English translation of her book might be that the editor/translator, or who ever it was, had written that "she was the best". It was something she never would have said herself. Miss Sally Johanson was born 1915. She was a trained weaving teacher who started to work within the Swedish handicraft movement 1936, with bobbinlace as her speciality. She died 1984. Lena Dahren Stockholm - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED]
