opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

       Profile: Gerald Murnane

       At ABC News Gerald Murnane speaks about life, writing ahead of Nobel Prize for Literature announcement.
       As they note:

He prefers not to travel outside Victoria. He has never been on a plane, never voluntarily been into the ocean, has rarely taken holidays and has never listened to the radio or watched television for more than 20 minutes.

But he likes maps and sits a globe near his desk where he writes.

       Four of his works are under review at the complete review, including Barley Patch and A Season on Earth.

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       Profile: Jonathan Carroll

       At the Los Angeles Review of Books Gary K. Wolfe 'surveys the career of American fabulist Jonathan Carroll', in Jonathan Carroll's Impossible Realism.
       Five of Carroll's novels are under review at the complete review, including Mr. Breakfast.

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       Grand prix de littérature américaine shortlist

       Perhaps thinking that Americans can't be trusted to honor the best American fiction, the French have their own prize which is limited to ... American fiction, the Grand prix de littérature américaine (with the additional limitation of the work having been translated into French) -- and they've now announced the four finalists for this year's prize; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       Novels by Kaveh Akbar, Richard Ford, Nathan Hill, and Alice McDermott remain in the running.
       The winner will be announced 12 November.

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       Lore Segal (1928-2024)

       Author Lore Segal has passed away -- see, for example, the Melville House announcement.
       The New York Times Magazine just published Matthew Shaer's profile of her the day before her death, A Master Storyteller, at the End of Her Story (presumably paywalled); see also Penelope Green's obituary (presumably paywalled) in The New York Times.
       See also the information page for Segal at the Cynthia Cannell Literary Agency.
       None of her work is under review at the complete review, but I should eventually be getting to some.

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       Crossword Book Awards longlists

       They've announced the longlists for this year's Crossword Book Awards longlists -- ten titles each in five categories: Fiction, Non, Translation, Children's, and ... Business and Management; see, for example, the report at Scroll.in.
       Good to see some of the titles in the translated category are from languages we see far too little from, including Assamese, Konkani, and Nepali. Hopefully, some of these will make it to the US/UK markets as well.
       The shortlists will be announced 11 November, and the winners 12 December.

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       Nobel Prize week

       They start announcing the winners of this year's Nobel Prizes today, with the literature-prize announcement to come on Thursday, 10 October, at 13:00 local (Stockholm) time; see the Swedish Academy notice; you'll be able to watch the announcement live at the Nobel site and on YouTube.

       I have not been following (or participating in) this year's speculation; as always, most of the names being thrown around are those familiar from previous years.
       There are the usual betting-opportunities -- Ladbrokes and Betsson, while Unibet, for example, walked away from this year's competition.
       Ladbrokes' odds are not readily accessible in the US.
       Betsson offers bets on a mere 21 candidates -- including Paul Simon ..... (See also.)
       Current favorites, last I checked, are:

• Gerald Murnane +350
• Can Xue +400
• Salman Rushdie +500
• Jamaica Kincaid +700
• Alexis Wright +700
• Anne Carson +900
• Ko Un +900

       (Salman Rushdie seems to have been yesterday's big mover on Betsson.)

       As always, there's a very active Nobel Prize in Literature 2024 Speculation-discussion up at the World Literature Forum, the thread now with over 2000 posts.
       Discussion hasn't been quite as active at the The Mookse and the Gripes discussion board, where the 2024 Nobel Prize-thread has only reached ... 33 posts, last I checked.

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       Robert Coover (1932-2024)

       American author Robert Coover has passed away; see, for example, John Williams' obituary (presumably paywalled) in The New York Times, or the AP report.

       I've read quite a few of his works, but none are under review at the complete review; he was at Brown during my college years, but I never encountered him.

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       Suhrkamp takeover

       Leading -- or at least once-leading -- German literary publisher Suhrkamp has now been completely taken over by longtime but also long not particularly active-in-the-business minority owner Möhrle Group (essentially: Dirk Möhrle) as, in a surprise announcement, we learn that he/they are now the sole owners of the entire business (his/their stake used to be 39 per cent), with the Siegfried und Ulla Unseld Familienstiftung (and with it Ulla Unseld-Berkéwicz) withdrawing from the business -- the end of an era.
       Apparently, Suhrkamp has been 'troubled' for a while -- see, for example, Roman Bucheli's report on Der Suhrkamp-Verlag ist völlig überraschend an einen Immobilien-Unternehmer verkauft worden in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Certainly, in the post-(Siegfried-)Unseld era -- since his death in 2002 -- its footing has been less sure (and less 'literary'); it'll be interesting to see how things develop from here on.

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       Olga Tokarczuk Q & A

       At The Guardian Anthony Cummins has a Q & A with the The Empusium-author, in Nobel prize winner Olga Tokarczuk: ‘We live with violence and misogyny like some sort of constant illness’.
       Among her responses: "I wrote The Empusium slightly out of anger and spite, I suppose".
       And she says:

the story I’m writing now might be my last huge book, because I’ve been having horrible problems with my spine. My body says: “Tokarczuk, this position you’re in when you’re writing isn’t for you any more – you should retire.” And I think that’s what I’m going to do.

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       Grand Prix SGDL

       The Société des Gens de Lettres has announced the winner of this year's Grand Prix SGDL/ministère de la Culture, a leading French translator prize, and it is translator from Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish Terje Sinding.

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       KulturPass numbers

       Germany is one of those European countries that provides money -- €100, in their case -- to youths once they turn eighteen which they can spend on anything cultural, the KulturPass, and at Börsenblatt they have the latest numbers -- with books being, by a considerable margin, still the most popular thing (and about half of the total) users cash in on.

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       Prix Hors Concours finalists

       The big French literary prizes tend to be dominated by the big publishers, but of course they also have their own independent-publishers prize -- runs by the Académie Hors Concours, they have a prix Hors Concours which has now announced its finalists; see, for example, the ActuaLitté report.
       The winner will be announced 26 November.
       Perhaps in imitation of the prix Goncourt -- the grand-daddy of French literary prizes, which notoriously only pays out €10 to the winner --, or perhaps in the low-budget 'independent' spirit, the prize money is ... not great: €100. (Well, yes, that is ten times as rich as the Goncourt .....)

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       Cundill Prize finalists

       They've announced the three finalists for this year's Cundill History Prize, "the world's leading prize for a work of history written or translated into English".
       The winner will be announced 30 October.

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       Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay Prize shortlist

       The New India Foundation has announced the shortlist for the Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay Book Prize, honoring: "nonfiction books about modern and contemporary Indian history".
       The winner will be announced 14 December.

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       William H. Gass centenary celebrations

       They celebrated the centenary of The Tunnel-author William H. Gass at Washington University yesterday -- and you can watch the proceedings on YouTube; it sounds like it was a great programme. (I unfortunately do not have the patience to watch this (or most any) kind of thing on my computer, so I can't vouch for it, but it does sound good.)
       See also Diane Toroian Keaggy's preview of events, WashU Libraries celebrates centenary of acclaimed writer William Gass.

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       Goldsmiths Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Goldsmiths Prize -- "awarded to a book that is deemed genuinely novel and which embodies the spirit of invention that characterises the genre at its best".
       The winner will be announced 6 November.

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       Comrade Papa review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of GauZ''s Comrade Papa.
       This came out in the UK earlier this year, and now (next week) Biblioasis is bringing out the North American edition.

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       (American) National Book Awards finalists

       The National Book Foundation has announced the finalists for this year's National Book Awards -- five titles in each of five categories.
       I haven't seen any of the Fiction finalists, but three of the finalists in Translated Literature are under review at the complete review:

• Saskia Vogel's translation of Linnea Axelsson's Ædnan
  
  
• Ranya Abdelrahman and Sawad Hussain's translation of Bothayna Al-Essa's The Book Censor's Library
  
  
• Roland Glasser's translation of Fiston Mwanza Mujila's The Villain's Dance

       The winners will be announced on 20 November.

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       MacArthur Fellows

       The MacArthur Foundation has announced the latest batch of Fellows -- twenty two of them.
       These 'genius grants' currently pay out US$800,000 (over five years)
       Several writers are among the fellows, but none of any of this year's fellows' work is under review at the complete review.

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       Prix Goncourt - deuxième sélection

       The Académie Goncourt has announced (warning ! dreaded pdf format !) the 'deuxième sélection' -- the longer shortlist or the shorter longlist -- for their prix Goncourt, the leading French novel prize.
       Books by Kamel Daoud, Gaël Faye, and Maylis de Kerangal remain in the running.
       The four finalists will be announced 22 October, and the winner on 4 November.

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       T.S.Eliot Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's T.S.Eliot Prize -- "the most valuable prize in British poetry" --, ten books selected from 187 submitted (but not revealed ...) titles.
       The winner will be announced 13 January.

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       Cercador Prize longlist

       They've announced the longlist for this year's Cercador Prize for Literature in Translation, with two titles selected by each of the prize's five judges.
       There are ten finalists -- and I have seen just ... one of these.

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       The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay's The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die.

       A translation -- by Arunava Sinha -- from Bengali, this is one of the still all too rare translations-from-an-Indian-language titles that was published in the UK (by John Murray, in 2019) and the US (by HarperVia, in 2020), but it seems to have gotten practically no print-media coverage (not even in Publishers Weekly, etc.). It seems to have done okay nevertheless; still, disappointing to (not) see .....

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       Reading in ... Japan

       In The Mainichi they wonder What is causing people in Japan, especially youth, to turn away from books ? as a 2023 survey finds: "Some 60% of Japanese people do not read even one book in a given month, the first time that has been true for a majority of the population" -- a huge jump in non-reading.
       Also: "69.1% of respondents said they were reading less than they did before" -- though that is only: "up 1.8 percentage points from the previous survey in fiscal 2018".
       Literary critic Kaho Miyake is quoted:

I believe the reason for the decline in reading can be attributed to a phenomenon that is Japanese people's move to distance themselves from long texts.

       Sigh.

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       Frank Wynne Q & A

       At the Irish Examiner Marjorie Brennan has a Q & A with him, in: Books are my business: Writer and translator Frank Wynne.
       Among his responses:

What do you like most about what you do ?

If I am a writer, there are some books I can write, if I am a translator I can be 40, 60 completely different writers and write novels that I could never have imagined.

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       Prix Sade

       They've announced the winner of the prix Sade -- and of lots of category-winners, too: BD/manfa, literary history, even DVD; see, for example, this tweet.
       The main prize went to L'Art assassin, by Pauline Mari; see also the Rouge Profond publicity page.

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       Galaxy Awards

       As the Global Times reports, China's prestigious sci-fi literary Galaxy Awards embrace web literature, with 造神年代 ('Age of the Godmakers') winning the best novel category.

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       A Borrowed Man review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Gene Wolfe's 2015 novel, A Borrowed Man.

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       Italo Calvino in the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade

       The latest addition to the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade is a volume of Italo Calvino's novels; see the Gallimard publicity page; see also the report in Marianne by Ève Charin, "Le Baron perché", "Marcovaldo"… Italo Calvino, l’enchanteur lucide enfin publié en Pléiade.

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       Jan Michalski Prize finalists

       They've announced the three finalists for this year's Jan Michalski Prize for Literature, "awarded annually for an outstanding work of world literature" in any genre.
       Two of the works are available in English -- and the Mathieu Belezi will surely come out in translation soon; it's already been featured in a piece (presumably paywalled) in The New York Times -- with one of them a graphic work; see the Drawn & Quarterly publicity page.
       The winner will be announced 27 November.

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       Grand Prix du Roman longlist

       The Académie française has announced the longlist for their Grand Prix du Roman.
       Quite a few previous winners of this prize are under review at the complete review.
       The winner will be announced 24 October.

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       Brontës get their diaereses

       As a great fan (to the irritation of many readers) of diaereses, I am pleased to see the Brontë-sisters finally get theirs set in stone, as Westminster Abbey has finally added the long-missing dots to the memorial in Poets' Corner; see their story on the Happy ending for Brontë memorial in 85th anniversary year.

       (In defense, and for an explanation, of the use of the diaeresis -- not to be confused with the very different (if identical-looking) Umlaut -- see Mary Norris on The Curse of the Diaeresis in The New Yorker.)

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       Prix de la Page 111 longlist

       They've announced the longlist for this year's prix de la Page 111, the French prize which judges books by the best ... page 111; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       The winner will be announced 23 October -- and, yes, the prize money amounts to all of ... €1.11, paid out in 111 cent-coins.

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       Publishing jobs in the US

       At Publishers Weekly Thad McIlroy and Jim Milliot report on how in the US: 'Government statistics suggest the number of publishing jobs has declined dramatically since the 1990s', as: "the number of people employed in book publishing in the United States fell to 54,822 in 2023, down from 91,100 in 1997", in Over 30 Years, 40% of Publishing Jobs Disappeared. What Happened ?
       They argue: "context is key", but still .....

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       Olga Tokarczuk Q & A

       At the Literary Hub they have a Q & A with the author, in On Returning to and Reinterpreting the Classics: Olga Tokarczuk in Conversation with Translator Antonia Lloyd-Jones -- about her novel, The Empusium, just out in English.

       The early reviews have generally been very positive -- see quotes and links at my review -- but at Vulture Robert Rubsam is so underwhelmed that he wonders Has Olga Tokarczuk Been Struck by the Nobel Curse ?

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       The Talnikov Family review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Avdotya Panaeva's The Talnikov Family, a nineteenth century novel finally available in English, from Columbia University Press.

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       Wolfson History Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Wolfson History Prize, "the UK's most prestigious history writing prize".
       The winner will be announced 2 December.

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       Crime-Cologne-Award

       They've announced the winner of this year's Crime Cologne Award, a leading prize for a German-language mystery, and it is Die Spiele, by Stephan Schmidt; see, for example, the Börsenblatt report.
       See also the DuMont publicity page

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       Fredric Jameson (1934-2024)

       It's been widely reported that noted literary critic and theorist Fredric Jameson has passed away; see, for example, the note at the London Review of Books.
       (Updated - 24 September): See now also Duke Flags Lowered: Fredric Jameson, Influential Cultural Theorist and Literary Critic, Dies at Duke Today and Farewell to Fredric Jameson at Duke University Press.

       Verso has published many of his books; I've read a few, but it's been a while; none are under review at the complete review.

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       Early Film Writings review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of the collection of Chris Marker's Early Film Writings, recently out from the University of Minnesota Press.

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       Reading in ... China

       At Radio Free Asia Zhu Liye reports that China targets high-ranking officials who read banned books, as:

Nowadays, any publication not entirely in line with orthodox Marxism-Leninism or the official view of Communist Party history is likely to be seen as "reactionary," as is any information about China's highest-ranking leaders, both past and present, according to a senior figure in the Chinese publishing industry who spoke to RFA Mandarin on condition of anonymity.

       Yes, apparently:

President Xi Jinping is coming for their personal libraries and private browsing habits in a bid to instill the same ideas in all party members regardless of rank.

       They've reached the point where:

Even dialectical materialism and critical thinking have become evidence of guilt.

       Disappointing.

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       Richard Powers profile

       At The Guardian Alex Clark profile the novelist, in ‘I no longer have to save the world’: Novelist Richard Powers on fiction and the climate crisis.

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       The Empusium review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of A Health Resort Horror Story by Nobel laureate Olga Tokarczuk, The Empusium, now out in English, from Riverhead in the US and Fitzcarraldo Editions in the UK.

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       Scottish National Book Awards longlists

       The Saltire Society has announced the longlists for their literary awards, Scotland's National Book Awards, in the five categories of: fiction, non, poetry, first book, and research.
       The shortlists will be announced 30 October, and the winners on 28 November.

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       Dayton Literary Peace Prizes

       They've announced (warning ! dreaded pdf format !) the winners of this year's Dayton Literary Peace Prizes, with Prophet Song by Paul Lynch taking the fiction prize.

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       Prix Médicis longlists

       The jury presided over by Sphinx-author Anne Garréta has announced the longlists for this year's prix Médicis -- interesting because they award a prize for the best French novel as well as one for the best foreign novel; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       With sixteen French novels and fourteen foreign ones listed, these are still pretty long lists .....
       The shortlists will be announced 9 October, and the winners on 6 November.

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       LLMs and literature

       At udem nouvelles Virginie Soffer profiles Université de Montréal professor Marcello Vitali-Rosatim whose work: "considers whether LLMs can transform the very idea of literature and examines the social, economic and cultural issues they raise", in Are algorithms and LLMs changing our conception of literature ? (Spoiler: "“I don’t think LLMs will have a real impact on literature," Vitali-Rosati concluded".)
       He notes:

Programmed to efficiently meet user expectations, LLMs can produce texts that are pleasing and well-structured but lack what literature often seeks to explore: the dysfunctional, the unknown, the peculiar. “Literature looks for such points of friction,” said Vitali-Rosati, “and the difference between texts of literary merit and texts of less aesthetic interest is precisely the ability to find these shadowlands.”

       But he also points out that: "Any technical tool we use to write has a major impact on what we can write and what we can think".

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       Reading in ... Paraguay

       In Plough Santiago Ramos offers a personal take on the situation in the country where he was born, Paraguayans Don’t Read.

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       Literary emission-reductions

       At the BBC Christine Ro reports on how Publishers try skinnier books to save money and emissions.
       She looks at a number of ways publishers are trying to reduce the carbon emissions of printed books, including reducing the thickness of paper -- and changing typefaces, discussed here at some length.
       (I would certainly love to see a move away from hardcovers -- certainly for fiction. Mass-market-paperback originals for all !)

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       Deutscher Buchpreis shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's German Book Prize.
       Clemens Meyer's behemoth, Die Projektoren, is one of the six titles left in the running; I have a(n e-)copy, and it's the title I am most curious about; see also the S.Fischer foreign rights page. (Fitzcarraldo Editions is bringing it out in English -- though given its length, that'll probably be a while .....)

       The winner will be announced 14 October.

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       FT Business Book of the Year Award shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year Award.
       Six titles are left in the running; the winner will be announced 9 December.

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       Caine Prize

       They've announced the winner of this year's Caine Prize for African Writing, a leading African story prize, and it is 'Bridling' (warning ! dreaded pdf format !), by Nadia Davids.
       There were 320 entries for this prize this year.

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       Reading in ... South Korea

       In The Korea Times Baek Byung-yeul profiles Kim Ho-woon, president of the Korean Writers' Association, in Writers' clan chief pushes for digital shift to revitalize Koreans' reading habits, as:

According to the national reading survey conducted every two years by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Korean adults read an average of 3.9 books from September 2022 to August 2023, a drop from the 4.5 books recorded in the previous survey conducted from September 2020 to August 2021

       Not sure he's on the right track here:

"The reason people read less today is because we haven't properly taught the importance of reading," Kim said, pointing out that many people, including writers themselves, have strayed from books.

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       Booker Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Booker Prize, with six titles left in the running:

• Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner
• Held by Anne Michaels
• James by Percival Everett
• Orbital by Samantha Harvey
• The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden
• Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

       I haven't seen any of these.
       The winner will be announced 12 November.

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       Overstaying review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Ariane Koch's Overstaying.
       This came out in the UK, for Pushkin Press, in the spring, and is out ... today in the US, from Dorothy.

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       Elias Khoury (1948-2024)

       Lebanese author Elias Khoury has passed away; see, for example, the AP report.
       Much of his work has been translated into English, with Archipelago Books publishing a good selection.

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       Contemporary Hindi literature

       In The Print Krishan Murari considers, at some length, Is Hindi literature adapting to survive ? It has more Chetan Bhagats than Omprakash Valmikis, as apparently:

Fresh voices are injecting energy, but there are currently more Chetan Bhagats of new Hindi writing than Premchands or Nirmal Vermas. A substantial contemporary literary canon seems absent -- one that truly captures the zeitgeist through imagination and craft.

       And: "The qualitative drift in Hindi literature is closely tied to the slow decay of the pillars that once supported it. Cultural institutions [...] which bolstered Hindi writers from the 1950s onwards, are now flailing" -- so also:

Up until the 1980s or so, Hindi departments were epicentres of the literary scene. [...] But today, the influence of Hindi departments has faded. They’ve become largely powerless within the campus, clinging to old practices and modes of thinking.

       So now:

Two very different streams are shaping contemporary Hindi literature. On one side are fierce new Dalit, Bahujan, and Adivasi voices who are breaking ground with stories and poems that challenge the status quo. On the other is a steady pulp invasion, advancing from footpath stalls to reputed publishers and even university syllabi, once the domain of serious, weighty prose.

       Far too little is translated from Hindi -- much less published/distributed beyond India -- and I'd certainly love to see more -- including more of that "pulp invasion".

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       Virginie Despentes Q & A

       In The Observer Anthony Cummins has a Q & A with Virginie Despentes: ‘I wasn’t writing Baise-Moi from a very good place’.
       Despentes has a new novel out -- Dear Dickhead; see also the publicity pages from Farrar, Straus and Giroux and MacLehose Press, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.

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       Dagger of the Mind review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Kenneth Fearing's 1941 novel, Dagger of the Mind.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

       (American) National Book Award for Fiction longlist

       The (American) National Book Foundation has now announced all the longlist for its 2024 prizes, including that for fiction.
       Ten titles -- and I haven't seen any of them .....

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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       Grand prix de littérature américaine longlist

       They've announced the ten-title longlist for this year's Grand prix de littérature américaine, a French prize for the best ... American novel (that's been translated into French); see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       The winner will be announced 12 November.

(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer)    - permanent link -

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