Bilingual publisher, doslenguas, opens in Philly

doslenguas is a venture of the grassroots nonprofit Casa de Duende that began in 2011, which uplifts, guides, and platforms underserved artists. Casa de Duende also commissions work, holds art exhibitions, performances, and “Collaborative Community Care” projects to meet critical needs, says Acosta, co-founder and artistic director of Casa de Duende.

Casa de Duende operates under the fiscal sponsorship of CultureWorks, which also provides office space and other assistance.

The new publisher revives a Philly tradition. In 1753, Benjamin Franklin noted, “Of the six printing houses in the Province [of Pennsylvania] two [are] half-German, half-English,” according to documents at the Library Company of Philadelphia.

Today’s shifting demographics in Philly and nationwide promise to give doslenguas eager readers.

“Philly has a large Latino community,” says Acosta, who was born in Colombia and has been a Philadelphia resident for many years. “A large number whose primary language is Spanish have moved to the U.S., but there are many diasporic individuals whose primary language is English. doslenguas gives both groups access.”

For Acosta, who worked in public health for many years, doslenguas achieves a cherished goal. “As a writer, I’d always dreamed of starting a press that published in Spanish and English,” he says, adding that doslenguas seeks to “… publish bold, unique, memorable and imaginative work.”

Bilingual publishing means grappling with the vagaries of translation.

“The Portuguese word ‘saudade’ encapsules many nuances about sadness and longing, but has no exact translation,” Acosta says. “It’s a reminder that translators must carefully choose words to approximate meaning when there’s no direct equivalent in the other language.”

The page layout, with one language on one page and the translation on the page facing it, lets readers compare the poems easily. Aesthetic appeal matters.

“We make sure that the book itself is beautiful,” Acosta says, “The paper, the font, every aspect.”

doslenguas presented its first title, “Amar/ To Have and Not Hold,” by award-winning poet Anabel Torres, at the Latin American Book Fair, held during Hispanic Heritage Month. Torres, who was born in Colombia and has lived in the US and abroad, was the assistant director of the National Library of Colombia (Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia) from 1983 to 1987.

Torres’ work was the natural choice for doslenguas.

“Her book had already been published by two important houses in Colombia and Argentina, but only in Spanish,” Acosta says. “She is also a professional interpreter and translator and knows intimately what she wants to say.”

Torres works with exquisite care.

“I am always very careful about keeping the meaning and spirit of a poem as faithfully as possible in the target language,” she says.

Gifts may await in a poem. “What poetry can give you, you already have inside you,” Torres writes. “Poetry echoes. Startles. Reassures. Soothes. Tickles or lets you cry. It teaches or unteaches you. And, like all literature, poetry keeps you company. This is poetry’s most precious virtue: poetry can be a particularly steady, compact, strap to hold onto, when life shakes you mercilessly, or even when it feels your very life just crashed.”

Next up for doslenguas is “Empoera,” an anthology of Spanish American women poets living in the U.S. due out in 2027.

Asked about the risk of launching a bilingual literary press amid shrinking arts funding, Acosta was clear.

“Sometimes you can’t wait for permission,” he says. “You have to jump in.”

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For more details, please see doslenguaspress.com.