It is Sunday, 8 February 2026, and for the past few days, virtual tongues across social media have been wagging over the U.S. Department of Justice’s latest tranche of documents relating to the life and sins of the world’s most infamous sex offender, the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Hitting the headlines of more established outlets are concrete revelations concerning such predictable Epstein pals as Peter Mandelson and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. Meanwhile, on social media…

For certain activism-minded netizens, the newest batch of “Epstein files” provides irrefutable proof that J.K. Rowling was a friend of Epstein.

Naturally, it does no such thing. If anything, the material being circulated suggests the opposite – but why let the truth interrupt the internet’s favourite pastime: manufacturing juicy misinformation that edges uncomfortably close to defamation?

This article addresses several of the claims being pushed by conspiracy accounts. Some are trivially wrong; others require a little more patience and a slightly stronger stomach. What unites them all is the oldest tactic in the conspiracist playbook: say it loudly, because most people won’t read the source material anyway. I do not expect this piece to convert anyone who has built an identity around not reading, but I do hope it arms the truth-minded among us with the facts – and, perhaps, the occasional well-aimed eye-roll – when these claims inevitably surface again.

MYTH 1: J.K. Rowling invited Jeffrey Epstein to the Cursed Child premiere & after-party.

Iota Aurigae, over at the Rainy Season Times Substack has already put together a solid debunking of this myth, which you can read here:

Rainy Season Times

Fact Check: Did J.K. Rowling Invite Jeffrey Epstein to a Play?

Since this is a fact check for a pretty viral claim, I am intending for this post to be for a wider audience than my usual readers. For full disclosure, I never read Harry Potter beyond the third book, I’m not a Rowling fangirl, and I do not worship the air she breathes. I am just making this post because I’ve seen this blow up …

Read more

3 months ago · 9 likes · 2 comments · Iota Aurigae

To summarise Aurigae’s work for the benefit of those who don’t want to delve into the details:

• The oft-shared PDF invitation to The Cursed Child’s New York premiere, the intermission supper, and the after-party was, on the available evidence, sent to entertainment publicist Peggy Siegal.

• Producer Colin Callender told Deadline that Epstein was not on the original invite list.

• Siegal appears to have called in a favour to secure additional seats for the dinner without flagging Epstein’s name to Callender directly. Epstein’s name was communicated to Callender’s assistant, Rhys Kimmitt, who handled ticketing logistics.

• In a Monday follow-up email after the premiere, Siegal indicates that only one dinner ticket was supplied, that Epstein’s name was not on the guest list, and that he was turned away at the door.

In other words: Epstein was not originally invited; he attempted to obtain access through last-minute manoeuvring that did not involve Rowling’s team; and he was refused entry because his name was not on the list.

One additional point that is routinely mangled online: Rowling is credited as one of the three creators of the underlying story, but not as a producer of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child productions. That matters because it limits the plausibility of the wilder claims that she was personally “running the door”, “handling the guest list”, or otherwise exercising direct operational control over the event.

As part of my own investigation, I compiled a “cast of characters” involved in the communications around Epstein’s attempted attendance. This may seem superfluous, but conspiracy accounts are relying on readers not knowing who is who — and then casually implying that emails between Epstein’s, Siegal’s, and Callender’s teams must somehow be “Rowling’s team”.

• Jeffrey Epstein - no introduction needed.

• Lesley Groff - Epstein’s assistant.

• Peggy Siegal - entertainment publicist; owner of the Peggy Siegal Company.

• Rebecca Drescher - Employee at The Peggy Siegal Company.

• Lila Walker - Employee at The Peggy Siegal Company.

• Marisa Frank - Director of Operations at the Peggy Siegal Company.

• Colin Callender - producer of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child; Founder/Chairman of Playhouse Productions.

• Rhys Kimmitt - assistant to Colin Callender.

• Ira Lesserson - Epstein’s driver.

• Merwin Dela Cruz - staff at 9 East 71st Street (Jeffrey Epstein’s New York residence).

• Jojo Fontanilla - staff at 9 East 71st Street.

• Sonam Dema - staff at 9 East 71st Street.

• Leo - staff at 9 East 71st Street.

For those who want to dig through the primary material themselves, you can consult a list of the files I have identified through searches of the U.S. Department of Justice document repository (“Epstein Library”) in the footnotes1. Or, for ease of use, you can download a compiled document of all those files here:

Epstein Files Cursed Child Compilation

3.82MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

MYTH 2: J.K. Rowling was in direct contact with Jeffrey Epstein.

Some X users appear to believe that J.K. Rowling is apparently the only woman on Earth who could plausibly sign a message “Jx”.

A widely-shared graphic claims to “connect” tweets attributed to Rowling – signed “Jx” or “Jo x” – to an email thread between Epstein and a woman who signs her emails “Jx”.

This is not evidence. It is pattern-matching dressed up as investigation.

Firstly, “Jx” is not an identifying signature. It can be an initial plus a kiss, it can be an informal sign-off, it can be a shorthand nickname, it can be… almost anything. Treating it as a unique fingerprint is the sort of reasoning that makes horoscopes feel like forensic science.

Secondly, the language details matter. Rowling is British to her bones, in both voice and register. Even I, as a British child, only learned that we spell “jail” as “gaol” thanks to the Prisoner of Azkaban. To me, an email from her referring to an “airplane” rather than an “aeroplane” (or simply a “plane”) would warrant a call to the police to report a suspected abduction.

Context matters too: the idea that anyone would offer to pay for Rowling’s plane tickets as though money might be a problem is not merely implausible but is so implausible that it should provoke immediate suspicion in any reader whose brain is not running on power-saving mode.

Let’s be honest, this one is simply too outlandish to merit this many words to debunk it.

MYTH 3: J.K. Rowling has never condemned Epstein for his actions

This is a silly one, so I’ll make it quick. A selection of X users claim that J.K. Rowling has never condemned Jeffrey Epstein, and has never even mentioned him until she came out to deny the claims above.

Admittedly, a search for tweets from @jkrowling containing the word “Epstein” only throws up her tweet denying any connection to Jeffrey Epstein.

Naturally, once one looks past the enormous mountain made out of a mole hill, one sees that the simplest answer is always the most appropriate answer.

As we can see, J.K. Rowling has commented on Epstein’s abuses, but when she did, she decided to concentrate on the victims – as we all should – instead of the perpetrator. For any right-minded person, the condemnation of that man’s abuses goes without saying, and we would all do well to remember the heartbreaking number of victims that were subjected to his abuse.

MYTH 4: J.K. Rowling deleted the records of her superyacht to hide her visits to Little St. James Island.

Now here comes an odd one. Honestly, I do not know much about the nautical life. To be frank, my knowledge is limited to the fact that – like my patience when taking my shoes off – the speed of boats can be measured in knots. All the same, I have tried to take a look into this myth.

An X user, @hehimta, claimed that Rowling’s superyacht Samsara deactivated its AIS (Automatic Identification System) and “wiped years of port call logs”, citing the fact that the marinetraffic.com vessel page was inaccessible.

When approached for comment by email, MarineTraffic’s AI agent replied with the following explanation (a request for human verification has been sent):

“When a vessel page becomes inaccessible on our platform, this typically indicates that we haven’t received fresh AIS signals from that vessel for 24 hours or more. If there’s no recent position data, vessels are automatically removed from the Live Map until we receive new transmissions.

Common reasons for missing vessel data include:

• The vessel’s AIS transponder is turned off or not operational

• The vessel is sailing outside our terrestrial AIS coverage area

• Signal transmission issues or equipment problems

Important clarification: An inaccessible vessel page doesn’t indicate wrongdoing or deliberate concealment. Our system relies entirely on AIS signals transmitted by vessels. When vessels stop transmitting, we simply display their last known location until new signals are received.

For private vessels, AIS transponder installation is optional, and owners can choose when to transmit. The absence of tracking data is a normal part of AIS-based systems and resolves automatically once vessels resume transmission.

This technical explanation should help clarify that vessel tracking gaps are routine operational matters rather than indicators of maritime law violations.”

Translation: gaps in AIS-based tracking are normal, and a missing page on one site is not proof of wrongdoing. It is simply proof that the site does not currently have data to display.

One can debate what private yacht owners should do. But “MarineTraffic doesn’t show it” is not the same sentence as “years of logs were wiped to conceal criminal travel”. Conflating the two is exactly how conspiracy thinking functions: start with a mundane technical explanation, then sprint past it into melodrama.

Oh, and as for whether any of this proves that Rowling used Samsara to visit Epstein’s Island back in the day… She bought her yacht in 20232.

MYTH 5: J.K. Rowling invited Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to visit the set of HBO’s Harry Potter.

On the basis of blind belief in the above myths, some people have even gone so far as to put forward the idea that Rowling was, and remains, a great friend of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor – and that she personally invited him to visit the set of HBO’s upcoming Harry Potter television adaptation.

It is a matter of public record (and was reported at the time by the Daily Mail) that Andrew visited the set of Hogsmeade Station and the Hogwarts Express in Windsor Great Park with his grandchildren. However, there is nothing to suggest that J.K. Rowling personally invited Andrew, or even that she was aware of this visit.

Some have suggested the location was chosen to facilitate the visit. This collapses as soon as you apply even a teaspoon of production reality. Location filming is a logistical headache: scouting, permissions, transport, safety, schedules, weather, crew movement – and, in this case, the additional circus of bringing a train and track infrastructure into the equation.

This is not mere speculation: The Sun newspaper described the Hogwarts Express’s delivery as “a military-style operation”, with the £4 million set featuring half a mile of train tracks “running through woodland”3. The idea that a production would contort itself to facilitate a visit by an executive producer’s friend is more fantastical than even Rowling herself could dream up.

The Daily Mail also reported that crew members were shocked to see him4, which rather undermines the idea of a carefully arranged, warmly anticipated invitation. And if a powerful figure had been invited in the manner conspiracy accounts suggest, you would expect the press handling to be far smoother than “awkward surprise”.

One can speculate about why the story emerged at all, but speculation is not evidence. Which brings us neatly back to the theme of this entire genre of posting: a preference for vibes over verification.

Conclusion

If there is one lesson to take from this week’s nonsense, it is this: conspiracy accounts do not need proof. They need props – a PDF, a screenshot, an out-of-context email signature, a broken web page – that can be waved around like a magician’s scarf while the audience politely refrains from looking at the other hand.

In the material being circulated, the simplest reading is also the most grounded: Epstein attempted to access a high-profile event through intermediaries; he was not on the original list; and he failed to gain entry. The “Jx” signature proves nothing beyond the fact that people sometimes sign messages with initials. An AIS tracking gap proves nothing beyond the fact that AIS tracking gaps exist. And a set visit on royal land proves, at most, that royals are as susceptible as the rest of us to the very British urge to be nosy at what’s happening in one’s neighbourhood.

The internet will continue to reward confident wrongness, because confident wrongness is faster to consume than careful reading. But the remedy is unglamorous and brutally effective: insist on primary sources, distinguish evidence from inference, and treat viral certainty as the flashing warning light it usually is.

Misinformation thrives on the assumption that nobody will double-check what they read – and too often, it is a safe assumption. Everything in modern life pushes us towards the surface: the scroll, the outrage, the easy thrill of certainty. Resisting that takes self-discipline. It is up to each of us to slow down, check, and think for ourselves.

It’s the same old slog, day after day—or rather, night after night.

Ground floor. I grab my morning coffee at 11 p.m. I try to find a joke to lighten the barista’s mood, but I’m unsure if there’s a joke funny enough for that.

First floor. I change into my uniform. In the mirror, dark eyes and deepening wrinkles stare back at me. My cross necklace lies on top of my uniform. I slip it under my top. Maybe He’ll be with me today, for once.

As I step out, I run into a young man leaving the men’s changing room. Paul, his name is. He’s just been recruited as a mortuary assistant. It’s his first shift. He asks where’s good for a takeaway after work. He can’t wait to tell his boyfriend about his first day. I wonder if he paid enough attention to the rule book. I stifle a yawn, force a smile, and tell him to try the canteen on the floor above the mortuary. His brow furrows, but I know he’ll understand soon enough.

Second floor. I take over from Cindy, with that typical, knowing look in our eyes as we meet across the clipboard listing tonight’s unfortunate expectant mothers. As she turns to head back to the first floor, I notice she’s still wearing her slippers—and that she still has the bruises from last week.

Mrs Brightburn is only two centimetres dilated after ten hours of labour and suffering from diarrhoea, according to Cindy’s notes. Looks like it’s going to be a long night for both of us.

Third floor. Baby Kildare from Saturday night is still struggling on his respirator. I’ve popped in to see him every day since his birth. I can tell he won’t be long now. Brian, the nurse on the postnatal ward, tells me he thinks the poor boy has still got some fight in him. He says it with a sympathetic smile that turns my stomach. There’s no point correcting him. No point in anything.

Back in the lift, my finger hovers between the third- and fifth-floor buttons. If the patients only knew what lay between them…

Fifth floor. I take my lunch break at 5 a.m. Even at this hour, the canteen is filled with drawn faces, dark with fatigue and darker with grief. I spot Cindy across the room at the vending machine, evidently in search of a midnight snack. She’s complemented her slippers with a hospital-issue dressing gown. Best not to bother her.

I force down some lumpy stew. The food has somehow managed to become even blander since we lost dear old Mrs Espry. One of the cooks reckons she was missing her grandchildren. The thought somehow makes me smile. I delivered those grandchildren when I was still in training.

Sixth floor. I push Mrs Brightburn into theatre at 9 a.m. It’s a difficult one. The surgeon almost gives up at one point. He’s exhausted, thinks it’s futile. He drops his scalpel, which only just misses his other wrist. A look of understanding passes between us. A doctor never abandons their patients. That’s rule no. 1.

An hour later, I take Mrs Brightburn and Baby Brightburn into the discreet staff lift, hidden from the eyes of patients. I lean over the gurney to badge my ID and press the button. As the lift descends, my eyes rest on the telephone button and its “PUSH FOR HELP” message. My fingers find the cross around my neck. I have no idea why I still wear it. Force of habit, I suppose.

Fourth floor. I enter the mortuary. Brian is already there, giving Baby Kildare’s details to the young man on his first shift. I should have been there for the end.

Paul arrives to process Mrs and Baby Brightburn. They are his eleventh and twelfth bodies of the day, he says. I could already tell by the look on his face. So young, so much potential. A man he loves waiting for him at home. Yet here he is, a few hours in, and I swear he’s already destroyed by the reality of this place. At university, a mortuary this busy was unheard of, apparently. Poor boy. I wonder if it’s just all the bodies, or if he’s figured it out already. He will soon enough. But how long will he last once he does?

Once the transfer is done, I head down the corridor to the main lift. No need to badge this time. There’s no risk of patients accidentally stumbling onto the fourth floor. When all this began, the hospital trust wouldn’t listen. The idea of closing down was unthinkable—or, as they put it, “not fiscally feasible.”

They shouldn’t have just closed it down. They should have burned this hellhole to the ground. But no. Better to call the lift company to remove the fourth floor’s button. Maybe then, they thought, if the patients didn’t know the mortuary had to expand across the whole floor, no one would find out why it needed to.

As the lift passes the third floor, my fingers find my cross again. I stifle another yawn. Maybe I have a chance, I think. The lift shudders, and I close my eyes, refusing to think about it. I know what happens if I think about it. Yet I can’t empty my mind. I think about Cindy’s bruises from her fall down the stairs as she ran to leave the hospital last week. I think about Mrs Espry and the grandchildren she last saw when they left our maternity unit twenty-five years ago. I think about the surgeon’s scalpel that nearly sliced his wrist when he considered giving up on Mrs Brightburn. Then the newborn faces of Babies Kildare and Brightburn flash in my mind’s eye.

I didn’t abandon them. I never abandon them. But I fail too often to save them these days.

The doors open. I’ve had enough.

Ground floor. Out of the lift, down the corridor, eyes on the front door. Despite everything, I hope that I have a chance. I almost strangle myself pulling my lanyard off to throw my staff ID in a bin.

I see Cindy getting her morning coffee at the start of a new shift. Our eyes meet, and a rare smile pulls at her lips until her eyes follow my trajectory and find the door. Her cup of coffee trembles in her hand. She knows what I’m about to do yet teeters on the edge of doing something about it. We both know what happened when she tried to leave last week, yet still hope and despair battle it out within her for control.

It’s despair that wins. It always does here.

She shouts for me to stop. I don’t listen. I want out, one way or another. So I start to run. I don’t care what it does to me. My patients deserve better.

Out of a neighbouring corridor comes a gurney and its overeager porter, but I avoid its attack. A slippery floor threatens to send me flying, but I manage to keep steady.

I’m closing in on the door now. I see the sun, low in the sky. The idea of its heat searing my skin again after so long propels me as I launch myself towards the automatic doors.

I pass the threshold. My feet land on the pavement. My heart gives in to the curse.

Fourth floor. Cindy pushes body number thirteen down the corridor into the waiting arms of the young, unknowing Paul. She passes on the message from management that there is no need for a post mortem. Peculiar, that. He sets to work preparing the corpse for storage. He neatly folds the hospital scrubs and places them in a plastic bag along with a cross necklace. I only saw her an hour ago, how could she just drop dead…? He writes out the name, the time of death, and “cause unknown” on a label. With the kindest care in the world, as if I could still feel it, he ties it around my ankle.

Once I’m safely stowed away in a freezer drawer, he types out a few texts to his boyfriend. First day from hell. So many bodies, and it’s not just the patients. My colleagues are dropping like flies. Pizza when I get home? He checks the time. His shift is over in half an hour.

All it takes is a fleeting thought of leaving for a scalpel to fall, stabbing him in the foot.

Only once he has finished bandaging himself up does he think back on the rule book.

Rule No. 1: a doctor never abandons their patients, not without consequences.

It only takes four scalpels before Paul starts writing a goodbye text to his boyfriend.

About this story

It’s been a while since I wrote a short story, but when I stumbled on Kristin Noland’s LinkedIn post with the following writing prompt, I couldn’t resist it!

I’ve not posted a writing prompt before, but this picture is of an elevator at a hospital. I would love it if you could write a few words explaining why the hospital would set up the elevator this way. I can’t wait to hear your ideas! Have fun!

Suffice to say, I had glazed over the “few words” part and ended up with over a thousand, so I thought “waste not want not” and decided it would be perfect for my website.

I hope you enjoyed this story! Don’t hesitate to comment below, restack, or share!

Vous êtes français ? Lisez cette page en français en téléchargeant le PDF ci-dessous.

Jack Pownall - Traducteur français-anglais

5.46MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

My Journey

Born and raised in England, I moved to Paris in 2020 to immerse myself in French culture and pursue a Bachelor’s degree in French Studies at the University of London Institute in Paris. Over three years, I honed my linguistic skills to achieve C2-level fluency in French, complemented by a Certificate in Business Management and French from The Open University. These academic experiences, combined with professional training, laid the foundation for my career in translation.

What I Offer

I provide bespoke French-to-English translation and proofreading services, drawing on years of experience across diverse industries. My expertise includes:

• Translating complex, creative, and technical content, such as marketing materials, press releases, legal contracts, and literary works.

• SEO optimisation, ensuring your translated content ranks highly in search engines.

• Project management, overseeing translation workflows to maintain quality and meet deadlines.

• Social media and content localisation for global audiences.

When I undertake a project with a client, it is never merely a question of just dealing with a project. To provide a quality translation, I not only take into account the client’s text but the client’s brand, history, and voice. This is where you see the difference between an AI translation and a human translation.

That said, I know that humanity has its limits, and robots can help us supplement our abilities and our reliability. With industry-standard computer-aided translation tools at my disposal, I can ensure that even the most complicated of texts can be handled without risk of inconsistency or inefficiency. In addition to my own prowess when it comes to the English language (I’d be a poor translator if I could not at least attest to that!), advanced correction tools help ensure that my translations are as flawless as possible.

My long-term and ongoing immersion in France, in both my personal and professional lives, has offered me fully bilingual fluency in French, so I can also fit into your content pipeline as a final proofreader.

Professional Highlights

Vogue France

As a Translator and Copywriter, I translated over 300 articles, many of which were syndicated across international Condé Nast titles such as Vogue India and Glamour. I also managed Vogue France’s English-language social media channels and revamped the “Vogue France in English” landing page for enhanced user experience.

Corporate Editions

I translated a range of texts for luxury brands and public institutions, including marketing documents, product catalogues, and legal contracts, as well as texts in relation to the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics.

Publications Agora France

My role involved translating and publishing content, organising the company’s annual seminar in Normandy, and training employees in English for international business communication.

Published Translations

• Introduction to ‘The Live Centre of Information: From Pompidou to Beaubourg’ (Actar Publisher, 2022)

• Les Gets Retro (bilingual edition, 2022)

• Micromégas and Plato’s Dream by Voltaire (2024)

Why Choose Me?

My translation philosophy is simple: precision, creativity, and cultural sensitivity. I understand that every project is unique, which is why I tailor my work to reflect the tone, purpose, and audience of each client. Whether you need to engage readers, drive sales, or preserve the literary charm of a text, I am here to help.

Let’s Work Together

If you’re looking for a translator who can bring your French content to life in English, let’s chat!

Email: bonjour@jackpownall.fr

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jack-pownall

I look forward to helping you achieve your goals through exceptional translation.

The Exposition Dump Opening

Let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start). As Space Babies opens with a 70 lightyears-an-hour jaunt through time and the Doctor’s biography, Ncuti Gatwa’s effervescence as the Doctor already proves to know no bounds and is ably matched by Millie Gibson’s own wonderstruck élan as she undertakes the careful balancing act between awed teenager and confident young woman. Ruby easily finds her feet as the Doctor’s companion and it is clear that we are witnessing a new take on the typical audience surrogate character, both in terms of the acting and the writing. We see here how writer Russell T. Davies has his finger permanently on the pulse, understanding that television watching has changed.

Ruby Sunday: Who are you?

The Doctor: I’m the Doctor. You don’t have to stand over there. Come and have a look! It’s called the TARDIS.

Ruby: Nice! But hold on, I can’t call you “Doctor”. No, I wanna know your name.

The Doctor: Yeah, that’s, uh– that’s tricky. Because I was adopted, and the planet that took me in, they were kinda– they were kinda posh. They’d use titles like the Doctor or the Bishop or the Rani or the Conquistador. Say “Doctor” for a thousand years, and it becomes my name.

Some may deride this episode’s swift churning-out of exposition in its opening minutes as a Disney-ordained info-dump – and it may well be that – or cite it as some kind of attempt to appease Gen Z’s appalling attention spans (I haven’t opened TikTok once while writing this, I swear…), but I prefer to see it as evidence of Davies’ ever-astounding understanding of the zeitgeist. He knows that his viewers, especially those who fall into his younger target audience, are only a Google away from diving into a Wikipedia hole of information on the series, he knows that many people already know about the essential premise of Doctor Who, and he knows that Whovians simply do not need this exposition. As such, he treats the exposition-heavy opening like a Conservative government treats state benefits, cutting it down as much as possible. Unlike a Conservative government with state benefits, however, he makes it fun and accessible!

The Doctor: Inside, it’s a time and space machine, but outside, it’s– it’s like a chameleon. ‘Cause once I landed in 1963 and they useds to have police boxes on street corners.

Ruby: 1963?

The Doctor: Yeah.

Ruby: Okay. Ooh, jukebox. I like that. Okay. So, back to the planet.

The Doctor: My world is called Gallifrey.

Ruby: Gallifrey! And where’s that?

The Doctor: Gone! Ruby, it’s gone, it’s gone. They died. There was a genocide and they died. So the one that was adopted was the only one left. I am the last of the Time Lords. And I am so, so glad to be alive. This thing flies. Do you wanna see?

After all, is there any other TV show out there that could fit everything from time travel to the butterfly effect, dinosaurs, the main character’s origins and trauma, as well as a reference to the show’s very first episode in 1963, all into its opening five minutes without losing the viewer?

Space Babies To The Rescue!

Having landed on a space station in the year 21506, the Doctor and Ruby have a close encounter of the snotty kind with the episode’s “monster” (or “creature [we] haven’t met yet” as the Doctor says?), the Bogeyman. This mysterious creature has the unexpected effect of absolutely terrifying the Doctor. Long-term viewers will know that this isn't a usual experience for the Time Lord, and Russell T. Davies takes pains to explain this fact for new viewers:

Doctor: The question is, why did I run?
Ruby: 'Cos it was scary.
Doctor: It was new. I love meeting new things, so why did it give me the shivers? I couldn't run fast enough. I was like whoosh!

A few more longstanding elements of the series are then introduced such as the TARDIS's translation matrix. As a translator myself, I would be remiss to not stop on this point a moment. For those unaware, the translation industry is currently up in arms as the AI revolution is sweeping the world and threatening translators' livelihoods (see: my cri de cœur on the subject). Now, I am not going to scream and shout that Russell T. Davies is taking the side of AI in this fight. As recently as three episodes ago (Wild Blue Yonder), his writing highlighted how an admirable character such as The Doctor would go to pains to learn "57 billion 2 hundred and 5" languages despite having no need to thanks to technology. After all, science-fiction has long played with the idea of automatic, seamless translation, and I would personally love to see technology like that in a distant future. It goes without saying that such technology would do wonders for international – or, in the case of Doctor Who, interstellar – collaboration. However, I would personally love it if Doctor Who could take the time to explain the difference between this theoretical, flawless automatic translation and the flawed, AI translation we have these days. Maybe it could have gone like this:

Doctor: Huh. Planet Pacifico del Rio.
Ruby: Oh, that's in English. They speak English here? English exists?
Doctor: Er, no. No, no, no. Humans all speak one language by this point. A bit like Cantonese. This is what it really looks like, but the Tardis translates. It's got a perception filter, so it helps you fit into every time and place.

Ruby: Oh, my phone does that!

Doctor: Pfft… Your phone tries to do that. It's cute. Like a baby taking its first steps, but with even worse vocabulary.

But enough of me ranting about AI, it's time to say hello to the titular characters. Because yes, spoiler alert: the episode titled Space Babies is about babies in space. Who’d’ve thunk it, eh?

Somehow, these babies – space babies – just about manage to defy the all-too-common uncanny valley effect that plagues most CGI-heavy TV shows. I must admit that Baby Eric may have needed a smilier actor given the number of times he was supposed to overjoyed but instead appeared to be in need of winding. But we, as viewers, can forgive this breaking of the suspension of disbelief because – in all honesty – those babies (SPACE babies!) are just too damn cute!

Talking of “too damn cute”, we also get to meet the real star of the episode, Captain Poppy, who shares a short but key scene with Gatwa that, in just a few lines, does more to win over new viewers to the character of the Doctor than the entire opening.

Doctor: But the point is, is that it doesn't matter where I come from, because I am absolutely lovely, aren't I?

Poppy yawns.

Doctor: That wasn't rhetorical, Pops.

Poppy: Yes, you are.

Doctor: And do you want to know my secret? There's no one like me in the whole wide universe. No one like me exists, and that's true of everyone.
It's not a problem, Captain Pops. It's a superpower. High five. Yeah.

Poppy: Yeah!

Many long term viewers will have fond memories of the fairytale Series 6 that heralded the beginning of Steven Moffat’s tenure as showrunner (more on him a couple reviews later…). Most particularly, they will remember Amy Pond’s swift understanding of a key aspect of the Doctor’s character: how if ever he hears a child cry, he is unable to ignore it and must help. While the space station’s abandonned babies – space babies – do not specifically cry, the Fifteenth Doctor’s immediate keenness to help them out of their predicament is, in my opinion, the best way that Russell T. Davies could have tried to make a whole new generation of children fall in love with Doctor Who. Failing that, there’s always fart jokes.

A D*mn Good F**king Nanny

The episode swiftly moves onto the action with the introduction of NAN-E (“nanomatrix electroform”, according to the Doctor) A.K.A. Jocelyn, as played by Golda Rosheuvel, Bridgerton’s Queen Charlotte. It turns out that a recession on the planet below, Pacifico del Rio, led to the space station’s crew leaving in protest as the government shut them down while obliging them to leave the birth machine running (anyone not following along with the hidden meaning here can Google the word "allegory" followed swiftly by "women’s rights in the United States").

Having stayed behind to tend for the babies from afar (“Cos I don't want to see them die. And I don't want them to see me die”) and via a swear-suppressing nanny filter intercom system, accountant-turned-space-nanny Rosheuvel’s Jocelyn offers us a starkingly truthful representation of the blind purity of maternal love in all its forms but specifically in the adoptive sense here. When she is offered the opportunity to rid the space station of the Bogeyman, she does not hesitate. While the Doctor and Ruby make it clear that this isn’t the right choice because they know that the creature is one of the children, and manage to save the Bogeyman at the last minute, the episode does not try to antagonise Jocelyn for her attempt to protect her children; her maternal instincts are not wrong, simply misplaced.

Doctor: It has been right in front of us. We've been saying it all along. It's all one machine. One up above, and one down below. The one up above grew the babies. The one down below...
Ruby: It grew the Bogeyman.
Doctor: Yes!
Ruby: I said this. I told you so. Six years ago, the machine is mother and father to the babies, and mother and father to the Bogeyman.
Doctor: And why? Because Jocelyn said that the educational software ran out of control, and then you said...
Ruby: It's like a story. The teaching software, it told a story.
Doctor: It invented the Bogeyman.
Ruby: For the babies.
Doctor: For the space babies.
Ruby: The machine is literal, like a computer. It literally said, "Babies need fiction, they need stories, they need monsters."

There’s No Such Thing As Monsters

As we reach the episode's climax, we discover that its opening exposition dump was not merely an exercise in catching up new viewers on the show, but does in fact tie into the themes of the episode. We learn that the Bogeyman was created from the babies' own bogeys by the space station's baby-making machine due to some buggy education software deciding that what the children really needed was a fictional monster to be scared. By dint of this rather unique "birth", this means that the Bogeyman is a one of its kind, or the last of its kind, just like the Doctor, and it is this that inspires the latter to put himself into danger to save the creature from Jocelyn's attempt to throw it out of an airlock.

Arguably, it is a bit odd, perhaps, to highlight the Doctor's realisation that the Bogeyman is the last of its kind; our favourite Time Lord typically wouldn't need such motivation in order to find a kinder way to resolve the conflict. On the other hand, this sequence can also be interpreted as emphasising how much being the "Last of the Time Lords" weighs upon the Doctor's mind. Either way, there's no denying that watching the Doctor fight against the vacuum of space makes for a thrilling experience and suggests that Gatwa's Fifteenth Doctor might be more of a daredevil compared to other incarnations of the Time Lord.

The Best Bits

• The recurring space babies joke. I've had some fun with it myself in this article, and while some might find that the joke was uttered a few times too many, it was worth it for the Doctor's "babes, space babes" line towards the end of the episode.

• "Babies to the rescue!" If ever I were in danger, I would feel honoured to be saved by a flamethrower-wielding space baby.

• The nanny filter, specifically Jocelyn's line to the Bogeyman that gets cut off just in time by NAN-E: "Don't you touch them you [cut] illegitimate person."

Overall Rating: ★★★☆☆

This is undeniably a great opening episode to introduce new viewers to Doctor Who, but when you know how good both this show and Russell T. Davies’ writing can be, it does leave more to be desired. The good news is that there’s seven more episodes to enjoy and a statistical likelihood of them improving as the season progresses.

Theories, Speculation, and Twists

This season seems set up to be either an incredibly satisfactory or mindbendingly frustrating one for hardcore Doctor Who fans who love to speculate on the season's overarching plot. Between the plot threads dangled by the 60th anniversary specials last year and Ruby Sunday's enigmatic introduction in the previous episode, we have a great deal of threads to pull on:

The Boss

A villainous character who, like the Doctor, has two hearts. Given the mention of classic Doctor Who Time Lady villain the Rani in the episode, many are speculating it might be her. There's also the option of the Doctor's nemesis, the Master, and some are even imagining the return of a Time Lord villain that hasn't been seen on screens since the 60s: the Meddling Monk. Suffice to say, we're definitely in for some Gallifreyan villany.

The Toymaker's Legions

Presumably a horde of other mythical, extra-universe entities intent on sowing discord and general mayhem.

Susan Twist

No, I'm not talking about the Doctor's daughter Susan but about real life actress Susan Twist. So far, she has made appearances as innocuous background characters in three separate episodes (Wild Blue Yonder, The Church on Ruby Road, and Space Babies). At this point, it's clear that we are likely to see her make a subtle appearance in each episode. There is a lot more speculation that I could make on this point, but since it relies on information obtained outside of the show's content, I shan't risk spoiling anything.

Ruby's origins

The companion's birth parents and the circumstances of her birth were already established as mysteries to be solved in her debut, but this episode has shown that there is something bizarre going on with Ruby, as mere discussion of her abandonment at the church manages to conjure snow from thin air in a space station, as well as change the Doctor's memories of events as he now remembers Ruby's mother (if that is her mother) pointing at him outside the church. Given the other plot threads running through this season, it is quite frankly wonderful to have so many possibilities and to have none of them be more obvious than another.

Next Time

The next episode will see the Doctor and Ruby go back to 1963 to see the Beatles produce their first album, unless Jinkx Monsoon's villainous Maestro has something to do with it…

Hear ye, hear ye, it is finally official: even the literary translation industry has begun to use artificial intelligence to cut corners. I may have been overly optimistic, but I quite honestly did not expect to have to write that sentence this side of the decade. The news came as an immense shock, and it came thanks to a whistleblow on X from a British publishing house dedicated to championing female voices, Héloïse Press:

For those unaware of how the literary translation industry works, especially when it comes to newcomers, this may seem to be a slight overreaction. Perhaps the agent just wanted to give the publishing house an idea of what the entire book was like, perhaps they fully intended for a real translator to take on the translation afterwards. That may be, but to fully appreciate the dystopian situation in which we find ourselves, we need to consider…

How To Get Started In Literary Translation (Apparently)

As a fledgling literary translator myself, I’ve put a fair deal of time into researching how one typically gets their start in the industry. From what I’ve gleaned so far, it usually goes like this:

• Step 1: Learn a foreign language to a native or almost-native standard, obviously.

• Step 2: Be a good writer in your native language, of course.

• Step 3: Read intensely in your target language to stay up to date on trends in publishing and to find potential titles to translate.

• Step 4: For each book that you think deserves a translation, seek out the foreign rights agent at the appropriate publishing house to find out if the rights are available.

• Step 5: If the rights are available, translate an excerpt of the book for free and sometimes write a “readers report”, offer them to the foreign rights agent who will (hopefully) send them to publishers.

• Step 6: Take it upon yourself to send your excerpt and reader’s report to publishers.

• Step 7: Stumble upon a publishing house who is interested in publishing that specific book.

• Step 8: Impress them enough with your excerpt so that they ask you to translate the book instead of offering it to their usual trusted translators.

• Step 9: The book makes it to print and you can finally officially say that you are a published literary translator!

Now, that already seems difficult enough, but we should also note that, from step 4 onwards, any number of factors can result in simply having to rinse and repeat the entire process from step 4 once again until you find success, with no income at any point until you reach step 8. Nada. Rien. Nul points for the Republic of Newbie Literary Translators!

N.B.: Other routes into the world of literary translation may be possible, but this is the typical route promoted by those involved in the industry.

Essentially, getting started in literary translation is a rather thankless experience, not unlike that of authors trying to get published. In both cases, an immense amount of free work is required before you have any hope of getting paid work, so it goes without saying that having financial and cultural capital is key if you want this process to go smoothly. Is it fair? Suffice to say that it isn’t, but it is how it is. One could be tempted to say that translators deserve a more secure entry route into the industry than authors, because we are typically more specifically trained in our craft (not that authors aren’t) and we are a smaller population of workers, but the relationship of supply and demand is evidently in the publishers’ favour in both cases, so there isn’t much we can do. So long as there are too many writers and translators to pick from, publishers have no motivation to make things easier for us.

So, what about this AI nonsense then?

OK, let’s get back on track. As we have established, one of the only ways to get your start as a literary translator is to translate and propose book excerpts for free. So, what happens if foreign publishing houses begin using AI to translate excerpts for them? Well, we newbies could continue to translate and propose excerpts ourselves, but we would be in competition with highly-efficient machines. This means that foreign publishing houses could easily propose excerpts from every book in their catalogue and entirely cut out new translators from even the opportunity to translate excerpts.

We should note, too, that AI is also capable of synthetising information, so we will also be cut out from the work of creating reader’s reports.

Where does this leave us? We could try to propose entirely translated books, like authors propose entire manuscripts, but those paying attention will already see the catch: AI can do that too, as we saw with the one agent who tried to shop an entirely AI-translated manuscript to Héloïse Press.

In any case, in a world where AI translation replaces entry-level translators in the early stages of foreign rights proposals, access to the industry will become even more limited than it already is. In fact, if you can think of any way that a new translator could break into the industry in this scenario, you are already doing better than this writer.

Now, let’s talk solutions

Where do we go from here? I have had to wrack my brains a little, but I have a couple ideas. One relies on publishers acting justly towards writers and translators, like we saw with the aforementioned Héloïse Press, and the other relies on the government caring about us.

Solution No. 1 - The Legal Route

One way to curb the encroachment of artificial intelligence on our artform would be to lobby the government to make it illegal to publish or otherwise disseminate a translated text without the translator’s name attached. In the case of published books, this would specifically require that the translator’s name be on the cover. This law would most importantly stipulate that this is required whether the translator is a human or a machine.

In practice, this solution would leave publishers with the choice of either employing humans or admitting on the front cover of their books that ChatGPT or DeepL did the work for them.

If this law were to be considered, the publishing industry will undoubtedly lobby the government for restrictions to it as well, so we could run the risk of ending up with a law whereby so long as an AI translation is edited by a human, that human’s name would supercede the AI and negate the need to put the AI’s name on the cover. This would be far from perfect, but it would still be a protection, which is more than what we currently have in this wild west of artificial intelligence.

Solution No. 2 - The Trusting Route

Alternatively, we could simply trust publishers to continue to employ human translators instead of using AI… Yes, I know, we would all feel ever so optimistic about our future careers as translators if this were the only possible solution.

Overall…

Who knows how this is all going to work out. For myself, I can only hope that I can somehow make my dreams of literary translation a reality. For more on that, feel free to check out my article about a French YA novel that I would especially love to translate. If any publishers or editors are reading this, I would like to specify that there are no hard feelings. I know that you all have other forces pressing upon you, constantly requiring more profit at lower cost, but I also know that each and every one of you do what you do for the love of the craft, just like us translators, and it is with that same mindset that I look forward to working with you one day.

Addendum: The Rant Thread

This article was inspired by my thread on X (Twitter) citing the whistleblowing tweet from Héloïse Press, which went minorly viral in the translator circles (that’s a new one for me!) Since my emotional state led to it become more of a rant than a mindful argument, I decided to put together this article to better express my thoughts on the topic, but here’s the text of the thread for those who are interested (you can also click the image below to see the thread on X).

As someone trying to break into literary translation, this sort of behaviour almost makes me want to give up for good. If agents are sending in entire manuscripts translated by AI, what hope is there for us newbies?

One of our only ways into the industry is through translating and proposing excerpts, but if some industry professionals are somehow comfortable with cutting out translators full stop, it’s almost certain that more are already cutting us out of this entry-level stage.

What does this mean for the diversity and renewal of the literary translator community? Pre-AI, opportunity was already dependant on financial privilege, with any hope of breaking into the industry requiring time and effort pretty much incompatible with full-time work.

That’s without taking into account the cultural and financial capital needed to keep up to date with source-language literature trends in order to even know what to translate.

That was then, and it was already bad enough, but now even the free work of the privileged few is being made redundant by ultra-efficient yet soulless AI.

Unfortunately, since I cannot even imagine a solution to this right now (at least not one that doesn’t rely on publishing industry professionals being particularly kindhearted), I have to end this thread without offering any hope.

More from Jack Pownall

Plato dreamt a great deal, and since his time people have not dreamt any less. He dreamt that, once upon a time, mankind had a dual form that, as punishment for their crimes, was divided into male and female.

He proved that there could only be five perfect worlds, because there are but five regular solids. His Republic was one of his great dreams. He even dreamt that sleep was borne from sleeplessness, and sleeplessness from sleep, and that you would surely lose your sight if you watched an eclipse by any means other than through a bowl of water. It was his dreams, then, which afforded him such a great reputation.

Here follows one of his dreams, and certainly one of his more interesting ones.

It seemed to him that the great Demiurge, the eternal geometer, who had populated infinite space with innumerable globes, wished to test the knowledge of those spirits who had stood witness to his great works. To each of them, he gave a small piece of matter to arrange, almost as Phidias and Zeuxis would have given statues and paintings to their pupils to work on, if one may compare small and great things.

Demogorgon was assigned the scrap of dirt we call the Earth. Having arranged it in the way we know it today, he claimed to have created a masterpiece, expecting to silence any jealousy amongst his comrades and even inspire them to praise. He was quite surprised therefore when he was instead met with hisses.

One of them, being very skilled in the art of telling jokes in poor taste, told him, ‘You have truly performed amazing work. You have split your world in two, and put a great body of water between the two hemispheres, so that there can be absolutely no communication between them. Everyone shall freeze to death under your two poles, or die from heatstroke under your equator. And how prudently have you set out these great deserts of sand, so that passersby may die of hunger and thirst!

‘I quite like your sheep, cows, and chickens; but honestly, I’m not too keen on your snakes and spiders. Your onions and artichokes are quite nice, but I don’t know what you were thinking when you covered the Earth with so many venomous plants, unless you were planning on poisoning its inhabitants.

‘Also, it seems that you have made about thirty different species of monkey, many more species of dog, but only four or five species of humans. I admit that you did give this last animal what you call reason, but I feel it is only fair to tell you that this reason is far too laughable, and rather resembles madness. On that note, you don’t seem to attach great importance to this two-legged animal, since you have given him so many enemies yet so little defence, so many illnesses yet so few cures, and so much passion yet so little wisdom. Evidently, you do not wish to see many of them remain on Earth, because—putting aside the dangers to which you have exposed them—you have done such an amazing job that one day the pox will decimate this species on a yearly basis, all while its sister will poison the life source of the nine parts that remain. And, as if that wasn’t enough already, you’ve arranged things so that half of the survivors will spend their days pleading for mercy, and the other half killing each other. They will no doubt be very grateful to you. You really have made yourself a lovely little masterpiece there.’

Demogorgon blushed. He did feel that there was both moral and physical wickedness in his work, but he argued that there was much more good than bad.

‘It is easy to criticise,’ he said. ‘But do you think it so simple to create an animal that is always reasonable, that is free, that never abuses his liberty? When you have nine or ten thousand plants to lay out, do you think it so easy to prevent a few of them from having harmful properties? Do you imagine that with a certain quantity of water, sand, mire and fire, there can be neither sea nor desert? My dear jokester, you have just laid out the planet Mars; shall we see how well you have done with your two large strips? How beautifully your nights shine without a moon? We shall see whether your people suffer from madness or sickness.’

Indeed, the spirits examined Mars and were quite harsh with its sneering creator. The serious spirit who had kneaded Saturn into shape was not spared either, while his comrades who had fabricated Jupiter, Mercury and Venus, each had to suffer some rebukes.

Great volumes and literature were written, quips were said, songs were written, fools were made, the factions became embittered, and finally the eternal Demiurge silenced all of them.

‘You have made both good and evil,’ he told them, ‘because you possess great intelligence, yet you are imperfect. Your works will persist but some hundred million years; after which, when you are more learned, you will do better. None but I can create perfect and immortal things.’

This is what Plato taught his pupils. When he ended his lesson, one of them said to him, ‘And then you woke up.’

Cast your mind back to early summer 2019. Do you remember where you were, what you were doing, what your life was like? That sounds lovely. As for me, I was in a bit of a rut, going from job to job with no clear trajectory in my career. What I did have, however, was a love for the French language. And so, with this one guiding force—and an unfortunate breakup instiling in me an immense desire to leave the country—I decided to take the proverbial boeuf by the horns and up sticks to be an au pair on the French side of the Franco-Swiss border, in a house with a view on the snow-capped climes of the French Alps, and a mere stroll away from the shores of Lake Geneva, a lake so large it even had a tide.

For those not in the know, au pairs are typically adolescent or twenty-something Eastern-European girls who travel to an English-speaking country to learn the language while earning food, board, and a very modest wage in exchange for childcare services. Or at least, that’s what I was led to believe from my experience as a British child partially brought up by au pairs while my parents tried to keep the family restaurant afloat.

As it turns out, au pairs can actually be of any nationality and are not merely confined to English-speaking countries. This may be shocking information for some, as I know that I shocked a fair few people around me when I informed them that I, a British male, was jetting off to France to look after a newborn baby full time in exchange for 300 euros a month (200 euros of which had to go towards French lessons…), a small room, and at least two square meals a day (breakfast wasn’t really a thing in this French household, and I preferred a coffee and a cigarette in the morning anyway, always far from the little baby, of course). Okay, now I think about it, the shock was perhaps more to do with the conditions than my incompatibility with the typical au pair stereotype, but I digress… What was really important was that I WAS GOING TO FRANCE!

The draw of the land of Voltaire and the language of Molière had taken hold of me for a fair few years then, ever since my mother and I began to research our own French ancestry. Over time, through careful revision of my old French textbooks from school, and assiduous study of Duolingo’s sometimes bizarre French lessons, I began to catch up on my French until I finally thought I was good enough to try my hand at a few months in France. Surely, I’d be fluent in no time at all!

Oh, how I was wrong! At least at first…

Immediately upon my arrival into the home of my host family, I realised that my French was nowhere near as good as I would have liked it to be. I had to do something. And so it was that one evening, holed up in my room after a rather trying first French lesson over in the nearest town, my eyes landed on the one French book I had brought with me: Harry Potter à l’école des sorciers. (That’s "and the Philosopher’s Stone" for the correct amongst us, or "and the Sorcerer’s Stone" for the incorrect). I had put off trying to read it ever since my ex-boyfriend had gifted it to me. It was a rather well-meant gift, intended to help me improve my French, but back then it seemed such an insurmountable task compared to some Duolingo lessons.

Naturally, my ex-boyfriend was right, and I probably should’ve listened to him sooner. About reading it, not anything else. Ex-boyfriends can only ever be allowed to be correct about one single thing post-breakup, and you must carefully choose what that thing is or else you might end up accidentally accepting responsibility for something. A horrifying prospect, is it not?

So, I cracked open my copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in French and began to read. It was… a slow experience. I had to stop every other sentence or so to look up what a word meant, check what certain verbs meant in different contexts, or find out why French wizards apparently have a penchant for waving baguettes about. Thank God for modern technology, Google, and the WordReference iPhone application, or else I would have had no hope of even finishing the book.

F.Y.I.: Baguette is the French word for wand. The bread just happens to be called the same because that is its shape.

So, alongside daily speaking practice with my host family, structured language lessons in town, the act of reading Harry Potter in French was slowly starting to improve my French. Or at least, improve my reading of French. I began to realise that more often than not, I had to Google sound clips of certain words to find out how they were pronounced. That’s when I thought, “Oh, wouldn’t it be nice if a French person could read this aloud to me?” Into the air goes the penny… It then took at least three days for the penny to finally drop when I came across an advert for Audible. I could listen to the audiobook at the same time!

And that’s how I finally found what I believe is the golden formula for learning languages:

I make a point to note "immersion", because I cannot say that Harry Potter did absolutely everything to improve my French. Actually being in France amongst French people definitely did a lot to help.

Anyway, I’ve waxed lyrical for too long. That’s what I get for trying to write at that magical time around 2 a.m. where the brain seems to fizzle with creativity yet dry up of any self-control.

Here’s my step-by-step guide to learning a language with Harry Potter

• Get the basics covered first. You do need to be capable of at least attempting to read in your target language.

• Read the first chapter with its audiobook narration playing at 0.5x speed.

• Do not pause to search for definitions or translations. Instead, thumb your nose at anyone who abhors annotating books and simply underline or circle in pencil any parts you don’t understand.

• At the end of the chapter, go back and research the bits you didn’t understand.

• Take notes on what you have learned.

• Go back to the beginning of the chapter and reread at 0.75x or even full speed, depending on how you feel.

• Rinse and repeat for each chapter.

• Over time, you should be able to increase your playback speed and eventually progress to only needing to read each chapter once.

This technique is not limited to Harry Potter. In my case, it worked perfectly, since I had already amply read the series in English, but you could use any book that you have previously enjoyed in your native language, so long as it has a translation and an audiobook version of that translation.

I hope this helps anyone wishing to undertake the seemingly insurmountable challenge of learning a new language. With time, help, great efforts, and hope, there is nothing to stop you from expanding your horizons.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter One - An Inhabitant of a Planet Orbiting Sirius Travels to Saturn

Chapter Two - A Conversation Between the Inhabitants of Sirius and Saturn

Chapter Three - The Sirian and Saturnian’s Journey

Chapter Four - What Happened to Them on Earth

Chapter Five - The Experiences and Reasonings of the Two Voyagers

Chapter Six - What Happened to Them with Mankind

Chapter Seven - Their Conversation with Mankind

Introduction

What is ‘Micromégas’?

‘Micromégas’ is a pioneering sci-fi novella by Voltaire, portraying a tale of cosmic exploration and philosophical satire. The story follows Micromégas, a giant from a planet orbiting Sirius, and his journey across the universe, culminating in a visit to Earth. Alongside a companion from Saturn, they engage with Earth's inhabitants, exploring themes of knowledge, perception, and the triviality of human affairs from their superior vantage points. This early work of science fiction uses extraterrestrial perspectives to critique and satirise human nature and society, blending imaginative storytelling with philosophical inquiry. Published in 1752, it is one of the earliest examples in the science-fiction genre, and is now presented in a new translation from the original French by Jack Pownall.

Who is Voltaire?

Born François-Marie Arouet, but better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire was one of the great thinkers of the Age of Enlightenment, with a life filled with more dramatic twists than some of his own works of fiction. Throughout his life, be it through his magnum opus ‘Candide’, his ‘Dictionnaire philosophique’, or myriad other great texts, Voltaire argued for a number of viewpoints that we take for granted today, but which were seen as revolutionary, even heretical, at the time, such as the freedoms of religion and of speech, or the separation of church and state. A dangerous man, then, in the eyes of the French monarchy and the Catholic Church. As a result, the writer, philosopher, and historian was imprisoned in the Bastille, and even exiled to Great Britain.

Unfortunately for his detractors, his exile in Great Britain would do more to inspire Voltaire than to quell him, as he found there a constitutional monarchy that put France’s absolutist regime into a harsh light, and met other great thinkers like Alexander Pope and Isaac Newton.

Returning to France energised and with a widened perspective, Voltaire continued to wield his pen with a vigour that seemed to only grow with the opposition he faced. His experiences in Great Britain had broadened his understanding of political and philosophical ideas, which he then seamlessly wove into his subsequent works. Not only did he champion the causes of freedom of expression and the separation of church and state, but he also became a fervent advocate for civil rights, often criticising the injustice of the French judicial system.

Voltaire's influence extended beyond the realms of philosophy and literature; he engaged in numerous correspondences with European royalty, intellectuals, and fellow writers, spreading his ideas across the continent. His witty, satirical style made his criticisms hard to ignore and even harder to suppress, ensuring his place in the public eye and the annals of history.

Despite facing continual censorship and the threat of arrest, Voltaire's spirit remained unbroken. In his later years, he settled in Ferney, near the French-Swiss border, where he became a figure of enlightenment not only through his writings but also by contributing to the local economy and education system. He transformed Ferney into a model of progress and enlightenment, attracting visitors from across Europe.

In 1778, Voltaire returned to Paris, the city of his birth, to witness the premiere of his latest tragedy, "Irene." The reception was triumphant, a testament to his enduring influence and popularity. Unfortunately, his health was deteriorating, and Voltaire died in Paris on May 30, 1778. His death marked the end of an era, but the beginning of his immortalisation as one of history's most profound thinkers and writers.

Voltaire's legacy is immense, influencing not only the French Revolution but also the development of modern political and philosophical thought. His calls for tolerance, freedom of speech, and separation of church and state resonate even today, making him a perennial figure in the pantheon of great thinkers. Voltaire's life and work continue to inspire those who seek to challenge the status quo, ensuring his place as a luminary of the Age of Enlightenment and beyond.

About this translation

I decided to undertake this new, modernised translation of Voltaire’s ‘Micromégas’ with a view of providing an accessible yet faithful rendering of this early example of the science-fiction canon. When faced with this translation, I felt that the most important thing to get right – apart from ensuring that the philosophical value of the text was kept through the translation – was the challenge of transposing Voltaire’s humorous, sometimes even sardonic voice into English in such a way that it still gets a laugh from a modern reader, while not losing any meaning in the original French.

I would like to think that I have done a fairly good job, but I will admit that the philosopher’s humour has not been 100% translated for fear of transforming the text too much. While the aim was to modernise the text, I would not dare to assume I had either the intellectual force or the right to make any adjustments to the actual content of Voltaire’s writing. As such, all my attempts at modernising this text have been limited solely to its language.

As a fan of Voltaire’s writings, I am providing this translation for free on my Substack, as well as providing an audiobook version of it as a free podcast, in the hopes of introducing new readers to a sensational writer whose innovative thoughts transcend the confines of their original 18th century context, and which still have a lot to teach us nearly 300 years later.

So, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, a mug of tea, or something stronger if you are so inclined, and enjoy this amusing yet philosophical tale of a giant from outer space, a six-thousand-foot-tall dwarf from Saturn, and what they had to teach us minuscule ants on Planet Earth.

Chapter One

An Inhabitant of the Planet Orbiting Sirius Travels to Saturn

On a planet orbiting the star Sirius, there was a wise young man whom I had the honour of meeting during his last trip to our little anthill. His name was Micromégas, a great name for a tall man. He was eight leagues tall, and by eight leagues, I mean, of course, four thousand geometric paces of five feet each.

Some geometers, such useful people to the public as they are, will be rushing to do the sums. So, given that Mr. Micromégas, a citizen of the land of Sirius, measured twenty-four thousand paces, which in turn make one hundred twenty thousand feet, and that we, citizens of the Earth, often measure little more than five feet, and that our globe measures nine thousand leagues in circumference, these geometers, in my opinion, will tell you that the planet that produced Micromégas should measure exactly twenty-one million six hundred thousand times larger than our own little Earth. And there’s nothing more straightforward or ordinary in nature than that. Consider, for instance, the small sovereign states that make up Germany or Italy – which you can wander through in only half an hour – and the Ottoman, Russian or Chinese empires. The chasm in size between them is nothing but a pale imitation of the tremendous differences that nature has endowed upon all beings.

His Excellence being the height that I have noted, the sculptors and painters of our society shall agree without difficulty that his waist should measure fifty thousand feet, giving him very lovely proportions. His nose, being a third of his beautiful face, and his beautiful face being a seventh of his beautiful body, it must be noted that the Sirian’s nose measured six thousand three hundred and thirty-three feet plus a fraction, quod erat demonstrandum.

As for his mind, it was one of our most cultivated. He knew many things and even invented a few. He was but only two hundred and fifty years of age when, while studying, in accordance with custom, at the most celebrated college of his planet, he solved more than fifty of Euclid’s propositions through sheer mental force alone. That’s eighteen more than Blaise Pascal, who, after working out thirty-two by just playing around, according to his sister, became a rather mediocre geometer, and an even worse metaphysician. At around four hundred and fifty years old, on the cusp of adulthood, he dissected many of those little insects that measure no more than a hundred feet, and which eluded ordinary microscopes. From his studies, he wrote a book which, while being rather tantalising, did earn him some trouble. The mufti of his country, a true nitpicker, and ignorant to boot, thought that the propositions in his book were suspicious, improper, foolhardy, and heretical. Suspecting heresy, he pursued him vehemently. The question was whether the substantial form of Sirius fleas was of the same nature as that of snails. Micromégas defended himself with great wit, which earned him favour among the ladies. The trial lasted two hundred and twenty years. In the end, the mufti had the book condemned by jurisconsults who had not read it, and its author was ordered not to show his face at court for eight hundred years.

He was only inadequately upset by being banned from a court filled with nothing but rigmarole and small-mindedness. He wrote a highly amusing song about the mufti, which hardly bothered the latter, then decided to travel from planet to planet to finish developing his mind and his heart, as it’s said. Those of us who merely travel by coach or carriage will doubtlessly be shocked by the equipment they have up there since we — down on our pile of mud — cannot conceive of anything beyond our own customs. Our explorer was marvellously learned in the laws of gravity and all the forces of attraction and repulsion. He made such apt use of them that, whether it be with the help of a ray of sunlight or the convenience of a comet, he could go from globe to globe like a bird flits from branch to branch.

He traversed the Milky Way in little time, and I must confess that, through the stars that litter the galaxy, he never saw that empyrean sky which the illustrious Vicar Derham boasts of having seen at the end of his telescope. I don’t wish to claim that Mr. Derham saw wrongly, God forbid, but Micromégas was there himself, and is a good observer, and I do not wish to contradict anyone.

Micromégas, after a good turn, arrived at the planet Saturn. No matter how accustomed he was to seeing new things, he could not help himself, as he saw the smallness of the planet and its people, from displaying that superior smile that sometimes escapes even the wisest of people. This being as Saturn is no more than nine hundred times bigger than the Earth, and its citizens are mere dwarves, at around six thousand feet tall. At first, he looked down his nose a bit at these people, rather like an Italian musician laughs at Lully when he visits France. But as the Sirian had a good mind, he realised quite quickly that a thinking being may well not be ridiculous merely for being six thousand feet tall. While he amazed them at first, he soon became friendly with the Saturnians. He struck up a close friendship with the secretary of the Saturn Academy, a man with a lot of wit who, if truth be told, had not invented anything, but who could speak very well of others’ inventions and who could write some short verses and long calculations reasonably well. I shall quote here, for the satisfaction of my readers, a peculiar conversation that Micromégas and the secretary had one day.

Chapter Two

A Conversation Between the Inhabitants of Sirius and Saturn

His Excellency had laid down, and the secretary brought his face close to the other's.

‘We must admit,’ said Micromégas, ‘that nature is quite varied.’

‘Yes,’ said the Saturnian, ‘Nature is like a flowerbed whose flowers...’

‘Oh!’ replied the other. ‘Let's leave the flowerbed where it is.’

‘Nature is,’ continued the secretary, ‘like a group of blondes and brunettes whose finery...’

‘Oh, what do I care for your brunettes?’ said the other.

‘Okay then, nature is like a gallery of paintings whose brushstrokes...’

‘Oh no!’ said the explorer. ‘I’ll say it again; nature is like nature. Why look for comparisons?’

‘To please you.’

‘I do not want to be pleased. I want to be instructed. Start by telling me how many senses the men of your globe have.’

‘We have seventy-two," said the academic. ‘And each day we complain of having so little. Our imagination goes further than our needs. We find that with our seventy-two senses, our planet’s ring, and our five moons, we are too limited, and despite our curiosity and great number of passions which we owe to our seventy-two senses, we can still find time to be bored.’

‘I’ve no trouble believing it,’ said Micromégas. ‘Since on our planet we have nearly a thousand senses, and we still have some vague yearning, some concern, that never ceases to remind us that we are mere small things and that there are much more perfect beings. I have travelled a bit. I’ve seen mortals so very below us, and I’ve seen some that are so very superior, but not even one that did not have more desires than real needs, and more needs than satisfaction. One day, I might find the land where we want for nothing, but until now I have heard no good news of such a land.’ The Saturnian and the Sirian then ran dry of speculation, but after much ingenious and uncertain reasoning, they needed to get back to the facts.

‘How long do your people live?’ asked the Sirian.

‘Oh, very little!’ replied the small man from Saturn.

"Exactly like us," said the Sirian, ‘We’re always complaining about how little we live. It must be a universal law of nature.’

‘Alas!’ said the Saturnian. ‘We live but five hundred great revolutions of the sun.’ (Fifteen thousand years, by our way of counting). ‘You'll agree that it is almost as if we die the moment we are born. Our existence is but a point, our duration an instant, our globe an atom. Scarcely do we begin to learn a bit and have some experience before death comes. Personally, I daren’t make any plans, feeling as I do like a waterdrop in an immense ocean. I am ashamed, especially in front of you, of how ridiculous I feel in this world.’

‘If you weren’t a philosopher,’ replied Micromégas. ‘I’d fear that you would be pained to know that our lives last seven hundred times longer than yours, but you know too well that when the time comes to return your body to the elements and reinvigorate nature under a different form – in other words, when you die – whether this moment of metamorphosis comes after living for an eternity or for a day, it’s precisely the same. I have been to lands where people live a thousand times longer than in my own and found that they still find reason to complain. Yet there are people everywhere with the common sense to come to terms with things and thank nature's creator. Across this universe, he has strewed an abundance of variety with some kind of admirable uniformity. For example, all thinking beings are different, and all are basically alike in the gift of thought and desire. Matter is spread out everywhere but has diverse properties on each planet. How many of these diverse properties do you have in your matter?’

‘If you mean those properties without which we believe that this globe could not endure as it is,’ said the Saturnian. ‘Then we count three hundred, such as extent, impenetrability, movability, gravitation, divisibility, and the rest."

‘Apparently,’ replied the explorer. ‘This small number is sufficient for the Creator's view of your little dwelling. I admire his wisdom completely. Everywhere, I see differences, but also proportions. Your planet is small, and so are its people; you have few sensations, and your matter has few properties. All that is the work of divine providence. You've examined it well – what colour is your sun?’

‘A very yellowish white,’ said the Saturnian. ‘And when we divide one of its rays, we find it contains seven colours.’

‘Our sun verges on red,’ said the Sirian. ‘And we have twenty-nine primary colours. There is not a single sun, amongst all those that I have visited, which resembles another, just as on your planet there is not a single face that isn’t different from all the others.’

After several questions like this, he inquired about how many essentially different substances there were on Saturn. He learned that there were only around thirty, including God, space, matter, extended beings with senses, extended beings with senses and thought, thinking beings with no extension at all, those who were self-aware, those who were not self-aware at all, and the rest. The Sirian, with the three hundred of his own land, and the three thousand others he had discovered through his travels, was stupendously shocked by Saturn’s philosophy. In the end, after exchanging with each other a bit of what they knew and a lot of what they didn’t, and after reflecting for an entire revolution of the sun, they decided to go on a little philosophical journey together.

Read more

What is it about?

Vince is a teenage boy comfortable enough in his own skin but who can easily lose his temper as soon as someone, at college, insults him for being gay. A very romantic soul, he’s waiting for the love that never comes, determined that his first time won’t just be with some one-night-stand. He has watched every gay film he can, and fallen in love with each of their actors, but when he finally falls in love for real, it’s with Octave, his lifelong best friend.

Why do I want to translate it?

Romance by Arnaud Cathrine is a French YA novel that holds a particular place in my heart. As a young translator trying to get his start in literary translation, it’s a dream of mine to see this book translated into English.

So, a bit about me: I’m a French to English translator and I’ve been living in Paris since those not-so-halcyon days of Covid in 2020. I’m as gay as the day is long (a turn of phrase which admittedly doesn’t work as well in frosty January as it would in balmy August), and my literary tastes pretty much reflect this. My teen years were spent in a tiny Somerset village, so you can easily understand how important YA gay romance novels were to me as an escape (as few there were even so recently as my adolescence).

I’ve read more than my fair share of YA gay romance (not that there are many) in an effort to feel seen on the pages I read, but if I had to pick out one single book that made me feel understood, it would be Romance by Arnaud Cathrine. As soon as I sat down to read it, the main character, Vince grabbed a firm hold of me with his unfiltered raw first-person narration and dragged me into his single minded, determined quest to find Love (the genuine article with a capital L). Through his bouts of swearing and unfortunate fist fights with homophobic bullies, I felt my lips burn and my fists itch. I cringed all-to-knowingly through his failed attempts at dating. I yearned wistfully as he discovered love right where he least expected it in the form of his childhood best friend, then fell with him into the depths as he lost it.

Thank god I decided to learn French!

Since discovering this novel, I’ve perfected my French (as best one can), read Arnaud Cathrine’s two sequels to Romance (did someone say ready-to-go trilogy potential?), had my own trials and tribulations in love (Frenchmen, what can I say?), and have now decided, as 2024 takes its first tentative steps in life, to put my all into getting that first big break in literary translation. This begins with me putting passion first and therefore doing my all to see one of my favourite French novels translated into English.

Who is it for?

In terms of readership, Romance fits into the mid- to late-adolescent part of YA. It’s for the LGBTQ+ kids that loved Heartstopper or Aristotle and Dante, who now want something a bit more in-depth and emotionally raw, but aren’t too keen on something as literary as Call Me By Your Name. It’s for the romantics who dislike Love Simon because it’s just too unrealistic and sweet. Judging by my best friend who gave the attached sample the once over and who is crossing her fingers that you want to read more too, it’s also for twenty-something girls that love a classic friends-to-lovers trope.

About the author

Born in 1973, Arnaud Cathrine began writing at the age of 15, and published his first book, Les Yeux secs, in 1998. Since then, he has published over 20 books, including Pas exactement l’amour (Éditions Verticales, 2015; recipient of the Académie Française Novel Prize) and À la place du cœur – Saison 1 et 2 (Éditions Robert Laffont, 2016, 2017). Arnaud Cathrine has also turned his novel La Route de Midland into a film with Éric Caravaca under the title Le Passager, as well as Je ne retrouve personne, which recently aired on the Arte channel as Neuf jours en hiver. An ex-presenter and producer for the radio station France Culture, literary consultant for the Correspondances de Manosque festival and for la Maison de la Poésie, he adores the theatre and, most particularly, musical readings. In 2008, he collaborated in writing and singing on the book-album Frère animal with Florent Marchet. The corresponding show toured throughout France over a period of three years. Most recently, Octave, the third volume of his Romance trilogy, was awarded the Prix Vendredi 2023 – Jury des jeunes pass Culture prize, chosen by a jury of seven young readers from various regions in France.

Are you a UK- or US-based editor?

If this pitch has piqued your interest, I would evidently be more than happy to discuss this title further!

Get in touch via email

In late 2023, from October to December, I had the pleasure of joining a boutique translation agency in Paris for a temporary contract of 3 months. Through translating and proofreading a variety of documents, from legal contracts to social media captions, I gained a great insight into the day-to-day workings of a translation agency, and continuously improved my skills and abilities, as is always my aim in any work I do.

Learn more about Corporate Editions here.

In the summer of 2023, I had the pleasure of spending my summer working as the sole translator intern for Vogue France in English, a specially curated English section of the Vogue France digital magazine website.

My first day

I arrived at the Condé Nast offices in Paris for my first day on 28 March 2023 in a carefully compiled outfit consisting of my very best high street fashion. Being rather fashionably-challenged myself, I had actually asked a guy I was chatting with on Tinder at the time to pick it out (alas, we were not fated to be the next gay power couple in the world of fashion). I soon realised that—at least in terms of the demands on one’s wardrobe—working at Vogue is nothing like The Devil Wears Prada. Everyone, and I mean everyone, was wearing jeans and T-shirts. Suffice to say, I stood out like a sore thumb in my dress trousers and blazer. But hey, at least I could enjoy the feeling delusion that I was better-dressed than the editors of Vogue!

Now, I can already hear the question on everyone’s lips. Wasn’t there a handsome, Stanley-Tucci-esque fashionista there to drag me into the wardrobe and bedeck me in the latest fashion from the runways? Well…

Of course not.

Unfortunately, life isn’t a Hollywood movie starring Anne Hathaway, and sometimes you have to pluck up and be your own Stanley Tucci, albeit without the Prada boots (they wouldn’t suit me anyway).

Over time, I began to hone my eye for fashion via osmosis as I worked on translating Vogue France’s articles into English and observed my colleagues’ vestimentary habits. Eventually, I was less of a sore thumb, but never quite a real fashionista. We all have our limits.

Luckily, I did a better job of honing my translation skills, whicb brings me to the actual curriculum vitae bit of this post…

The werk work

Each day, I would begin by researching the day’s top trending topics and topics with potential to trend (celebrity birthdays, scheduled events, etc.). I would then curate a selection of French articles, including the latest news and evergreen content in line with the day’s topics. This research fuelled my choice of articles to translate that day.

In order to ensure a careful balance of speed and quality, my translation process consisted of an initial, almost literal translation followed by several rounds of meticulous editing to improve style and ensure an accurate translation.

In between translating articles, I would manage Vogue France’s international Facebook page, which mostly consisted of preparing posts to share relevant evergreen articles, moderating comments, and scheduling native image posts.

Articles I wrote

I’m a fan of The Devil Wears Prada, and here’s why I have high expectations for its musical adaptation

by Jack Pownall - 21 September 2023

The Devil Wears Prada, the iconic film about the ruthless world of fashion, has still got some surprises in store for us. Following a somewhat rocky first attempt at a run in Chicago last year, a musical version of the cult film has been reimagined by three-time Tony Award winner Jerry Mitchell and is now set to debut at London’s Dominion Theatre in October 2024, after a preview season in Plymouth during the summer.

Read this article in French here.

The best LGBTQ+ books are right inside this bookstore

by Jack Pownall - 5 July 2023

While LGBTQ+ books are becoming increasingly popular these days, there was a time when they were hard to find. Luckily, the bookstore Les Mots à la Bouche in Paris, a reference point for the Parisian LGBTQ+ community as well as for literature, is the ideal place to find the real gem you're looking for.

Read this article in French here.

Drag Race France is back!

by Jack Pownall - 7 June 2023

Drag Race France has decided to offer us a fabulous gift for Pride Month. The airdate for its second season has officially been announced on Instagram. Time for a catchup on this successful French drag competition show.

Read this article in French here.

Articles I translated

All of Us Strangers is potentially the sexiest gay romance of the year

by Marthe Mabille - 22 September 2023

While the film All of Us Strangers is on everyone's lips in the UK, it is also capturing the attention of cinephiles around the world. A charming and incredibly talented actor duo, a mysterious plot intertwined with sizzling scenes... Here's everything you need to know.

Read this article in French here.

How Meghan Markle owns the monochrome look

by Chloé Castanheira - 20 September 2023

Known for her penchant for elegantly classic looks, Meghan Markle is celebrated for her keen fashion sense and ability to create timeless, minimalist silhouettes. As the guest of honor at the Invictus Games in Dusseldorf, the Duchess of Sussex has turned each of her appearances into a true fashion moment, unveiling a series of monochromatic looks. A style lesson in itself.

Read this article in French here.

Here's what the new iPhone 15, Plus, Pro and Pro Max look like!

by Alexandre Marain - 13 September 2023

At each keynote, it's a tradition: Apple makes the crowds go crazy. This September 12, 2023, in Cupertino, California, the company unveiled four new iPhone models: the iPhone 15, the iPhone 15 Plus, the iPhone 15 Pro and the iPhone 15 Pro Max. What should we make of these new high-tech models? Vogue France breaks it down.

Read this article in French here.

About ULIP

The University of London Institute in Paris is a department of the University of London dedicated to French studies and the learning of the French language. It is the only British university in continental Europe.

Subjects studied

First year

• Œuvres: critical approaches to literature and visual arts.

• Written and oral expression.

• Issues and debates in contemporary French politics.

• History and histories: social, political and cultural issues from the Revolution to the present day.

• Cultural Studies.

Second year

• Introduction to translation (French/English).

• Advanced grammar and media communication.

• Gender and sexuality (literary studies).

• Introduction to French linguistics.

• Politics and Fiction; Queer Politics in Contemporary France.

• Fundamentals of Management.

• Marketing.

Third year

• Advanced French-English translation.

• Advanced English-French translation.

• French linguistics.

• Advanced French written and oral.

• Contemporary critical theory.

• Trauma & Transmission.

• Fin de siècle.

During my teenage years, while living in a small village in the West Country of England, I had little to do and a fair bit of time on my hands. Having discovered the virtual world platform Second Life and learned one could create anything one wished and sell it too, I delved into learning the art of 3D content creation.

With my associate, I founded a home and garden store within Second Life called ChiMia, where we sold my creations. These ranged from small furniture and decor pieces to entire apartments inspired by my dream of living in France (see image above).

Over the years, this experience turned me into a rather skilled creator and helped me master a variety of software, from programmes for 3D art for creating our products to industry-standard graphics designer applications for crafting our marketing materials. Here’s a non-exhaustive list of the software I learned to use over the years:

• Autodesk 3DS Max

• Autodesk Maya

• Blender

• ZBrush

• Photoshop

• Illustrator

• Substance Painter