MARCELO, MARTELLO, MARSHMALLOW

In the same vein as the droll old bit of nonsense “Master of All Masters,” Rocha’s 1976 tale, newly translated for English-speaking readers, features a lad who insists on using his own fanciful vocabulary.

After asking his puzzled but indulgent parents how a table, a ball, and other items got their names, Marcelo is unsatisfied by their answers and instead decides to come up with his own words. So it is, unfortunately, that when he rushes in, declaring, “Barky’s dogstayer blastflamed,” no one understands until too late that the doghouse is on fire. The story was originally written in Portuguese, and this version is a real tour de force for translator Goldfajn. Not only is the narrative peppered with original coinages that make sense (of a sort) in English, but it’s also infused with general wordplay: “And why, in this Latin language, is a table not called a chair, and a chair is not called hair, and hair is not called bear?” Rather than taking a calamitous turn, the story has a warm feel as Marcelo’s parents take their son’s quirks in stride, just doing their best to keep up with his pronouncements. Matsusaki’s illustrations, also new, underscore the episode’s more surreal aspects by incorporating snipped-out fragments of photos into each scene, including depictions of faces and hands; several figures, among them Marcelo and his mother, have darker skin than others.

Fun to read aloud, as well as offering clever encouragement to think outside the linguistic box.