opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

2 - 10 November 2023

2 November: Taiwan Literature Awards | Sunday Times Literary Awards | Governor General's Literary Awards finalists | Donald Keene on 'The Japanese Classics'
3 November: Nordic Council Literature Prize | Translation Prizes judges announced
4 November: Terms defining the (Japanese) times | Georges Perec's games | Beethoven's Assassins review
5 November: Grand Prix Littéraire du Bénin | Kindred People's Literary Award | Dennis Cooper Q & A | 'The new literature of Berlin' ?
6 November: Hamsun's Hunger and Pan | My Death review
7 November: Österreichischer Buchpreis | Georg-Büchner-Preis speech | National Book Award-judging | Gospodinov on fiction in these times | Bot review
8 November: Prix Goncourt (and Renaudot) | Premio Cervantes | Daesan Literary Awards | Geetanjali Shree on Hindi | Faber & Faber goes bust !
9 November: Goldsmiths Prize | Cundill History Prize | Governor General's Literary Awards | Bayerischer Buchpreis | Andrew Wylie profile(s) | A.L.Kennedy at Buch Wien | Soul of a Jew review
10 November: Boekenbon Literatuurprijs | Warwick Prize shortlist | David Cohen Prize | Die Tigerin review

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       Boekenbon Literatuurprijs

       They've announced the winner of this year's Boekenbon Literatuurprijs -- which you might remember in its previous incarnations as the BookSpot Literatuurprijs, ECI Literatuurprijs, or AKO Literatuurprijs (with a €50,000 payout to the winner, finding and holding on to a sponsor is apparently challenging ...), the leading Dutch-language fiction prize, and it is Mauk, by Jan Vantoortelboom; see also the official press release (warning ! dreaded pdf format !).
       See also the Flanders Literature information page for Mauk, and the Atlas publicity page.

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

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       Warwick Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Warwick Prize for Women in Translation.

       Only one of the eight titles is under review at the complete review -- Nichola Smalley's translation of Amanda Svensson's A System So Magnificent it is Blinding (and I only have one more of these titles).
       The winner will be announced 23 November.

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       David Cohen Prize

       The David Cohen Prize for Literature is a £40,000 biennial prize recognizing: "a living writer from the UK or Republic of Ireland for a lifetime's achievement in literature" and they've now announced this year's winner -- John Burnside.

       The only one his books under review at the complete review is The Dumb House.

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       Die Tigerin review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Walter Serner's Die Tigerin: Eine absonderliche Liebesgeschichte.

       There was apparently an English translation of this, but it doesn't seem to have seen the light of day -- but an English edition is forthcoming from Twisted Spoon Press, who already brought out his Last Loosening.
       Die Tigerin apparently did very well, back in the day -- selling some 150,000 copies.

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

       Goldsmiths Prize

       They've announced the winner of this year's Goldsmiths Prize, a £10,000 prize that: "recognises writing that breaks the mould, opens up new possibilities for the novel form, and embodies the spirit of invention", and it is Cuddy, by Benjamin Myers; see also the Bloomsbury publicity page.

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       Cundill History Prize

       They've announced the winner of this year's US$75,000 Cundill History Prize, and it is Red Memory, by Tania Branigan -- billed in the UK subtitle as Living, Remembering and Forgetting China's Cultural Revolution and in the US subtitle as The Afterlives of China's Cultural Revolution (hey, at least they were on the same page with the title; that's not always a given, either ...).
       See also the publicity pages from Faber & Faber and W.W.Norton, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.

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       Governor General's Literary Awards

       The Canada Council for the Arts has announced the winners of this year's Governor General's Literary Awards, in seven categories, one set in English, one in French.
       The English-language fiction winner was Chrysalis by Anuja Varghese, and the winning translation into English was Peter McCambridge's of La logeuse, by Éric Dupont, as Rosa's Very Own Personal Revolution.
       The French-language fiction winner was Galumpf by Marie Hélène Poitras, and the winning translation into French was Catherine Ego's of Out of the Sun, by Esi Edugyan.

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       Bayerischer Buchpreis

       A day after the Austrian Book Prize, they announced the winners of this year's Bavarian Book Prize, with Vaters Meer by Deniz Utlu taking the fiction prize -- see the Suhrkamp foreign rights page -- and Jan Philipp Reemtsma's Christoph Martin Wieland-biography (which I am very curious about) winning the non-fiction category.

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       Andrew Wylie profile(s)

       In The Guardian Alex Blasdel has a lengthy profile of the (in)famous literary agent, in Days of The Jackal: how Andrew Wylie turned serious literature into big business -- no doubt a soon-to-be much linked-to and talked about (in the small would-be literary world ...) piece.
       Representative spouting:

Not content to just sit back and watch the price tick up, Wylie decided he would try to dictate the value of other foreign works in the Chinese market. “I thought, ‘We need to roll out the tanks,’” Wylie gleefully recounted in his New York offices earlier this year. “We need a Tiananmen Square !”

       Not sure how that will go over with his authors, but a Tiananmen Square-endorsement (as: that's the way to do it !) is one way of cozying up to the regime, I suppose.
       Note that just a few weeks ago Harry Lambert profiled Wylie as well, in the New Statesman in the (semi-paywalled ?) Andrew Wylie's rules for life. Why all the attention(-seeking ?) all of a sudden ?
       (Updated - 13 November): And now there's another profile -- a Q & A this time, by David Marchese, in The New York Times Magazine: When Ruthless Cultural Elitism Is Exactly the Job (presumably paywalled). Seriously, what is going on here ?

       Wylie has obviously often done very well for his authors -- big paydays -- but far too often I don't think they (or rather their work) are well-served, especially those estates: far too little of the work is in print (or available in translation). Maybe that's the way to squeeze the most money out of publishers, but I don't think it serves either the authors' long term interest, or readers' short term ones .....

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       A.L.Kennedy at Buch Wien

       The Viennese Book Fair, Buch Wien, opened yesterday, and A.L.Kennedy gave the opening speech, which you can watch here.
       I was there, and it was good to see a nice, large and enthusiastic audience. The fair itself has a solid line-up -- mostly Austrian and German-language authors, but also some prominent international ones, including Jo Nesbø (with The Night House now also out in German), Drago Jančar, Michal Hvorecký, and Boualem Sansal. (They also list Örkény István, but that seems hoping for way too much .....)
       It runs through the weekend; I'll be checking out more events today.

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       Soul of a Jew review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Joshua Sobol's play about The Death of Otto Weinger • Weininger's Last Night, Soul of a Jew.

       This has been published in English -- but the only copies I've seen online are in a ring-bound (!) version.

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

       Prix Goncourt (and Renaudot)

       The Académie Goncourt has announced the winner of the biggest French literary prize, the prix Goncourt, and it is Veiller sur elle, by Jean-Baptiste Andrea.
       See also publisher L'Iconoclaste's (inconveniently under-construction) site and the 2 Seas Agency information page -- where you can learn that rights have been sold in ten languages/territories and offers have been received in six more and yet English language rights are apparently still up for grabs, as US/UK publishers prove yet again to be international lazy-ass conservative laggards. (The win should make for the necessary nudge for someone to buy it (at a now inflated price); while The New York Times' report suggests only that: "Some winners, like The Anomaly, a science-fiction thriller about the mysteries surrounding a Paris-New York flight that won in 2019, later land translation deals", in fact most do; see also the prix Goncourt winners under review at the complete review.)

       Meanwhile, the prix Renaudot -- second fiddle to the Goncourt -- went to Les Insolents, by Ann Scott; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.

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       Premio Cervantes

       They've announced the winner of this year's Premio de Literatura en Lengua Castellana Miguel de Cervantes, the leading Spanish-language author prize, and it is Luis Mateo Díez.
       Though prolific -- and winner of many prizes -- none of his work appears to have been translated into English.

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       Daesan Literary Awards

       The Daesan Foundation has announced the winners of this year's Daesan Literary Awards, a leading South Korea literary award, with 82-year-old Hyun Ki-young's three-volume 제주도우다 winning the fiction award; see also the Changbi publicity page; see also Hwang Dong-hee's report in The Korea Herald, 'Oh, Jejudo' by Hyun Ki-young among this year's Daesan Literary Awards winners.
       Not sure this will make it into English anytime soon (and the prize doesn't have a great translation record in any case -- though the 2001 fiction winner, The Guest by Hwang Sok-yong, did come out in English). And if it does, I suspect that's not exactly the title they're going to go with.
       Meanwhile, the translation of Cheon Myeong-kwan's Whale won the translation prize -- but not Chi-Young Kim's English translation (Archipelago) but rather the German one (as the translation prize rotates through honoring translations into specific languages -- English, French, German, and Spanish -- and this was a German year).

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

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       Geetanjali Shree on Hindi

       In The Indian Express Tomb of Sand-author Geetanjali Shree writes on What Hindi purists don't understand about Hindi (which applies to practically all languages).

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       Faber & Faber goes bust !

       Okay, it's the unrelated German Faber & Faber rather than the storied UK publisher Faber & Faber, but, yes, as Börsenblatt reports, they have declared bankruptcy.

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

       Österreichischer Buchpreis

       They've announced the winner of this year's Austrian Book Prize, selected from 137 (unfortunately not revealed) entries, and it is Monde vor der Landung, by Clemens J. Setz.
       See also the Suhrkamp foreign rights page; Spanish and Italian rights have been sold; English-language ... apparently not yet -- but you have to figure this will come out in the US/UK at some point (though so far only his Indigo has been translated into English).
       The only Setz works under review at the complete review are Die Bienen und das Unsichtbare and, as of yesterday, Bot.

       (Recall also that the winner of this year's German Book Prize, Echtzeitalter, by Austrian author Tonio Schachinger was not even longlisted for this year's Austrian Book Prize .....)

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

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       Georg-Büchner-Preis speech

       Kruso-author Lutz Seiler picked up his Georg Büchner Prize -- the leading German-language author prize -- over the weekend, and they've now made his acceptance speech, Das Radiumohr oder Heimweh nach Halden, available online.

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

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       National Book Award-judging

       A fascinating piece at Public Books by Alexander Manshel and Melanie Walsh looks at What 35 Years of Data Can Tell Us about Who Will Win the National Book Award -- whereby, as they point out, the data of interest and significance is: who is doing the judging ?
       Among the observations:

Over the last 35 years, just 25 people have served as judges more than 700 times for over 30 unique prizes. These 25 people make up 25 percent of all jury positions in that period.

       And

     Among these, Joy Williams -- short story writer, novelist, and Pulitzer Prize finalist -- is the single most prolific prize judge of the last century. Williams has served on committees that have awarded more than 75 literary prizes to more than 150 writers, doling out, in total, millions of dollars in award money.

       (They do note that Williams' representative -- she herself did not deign to comment directly -- passed along: "that this fact about her judging the most literary prizes is not correct", and they acknowledge that their numbers mostly have: "to do with Williams's work over the last 15 years as a prize judge for the American Academy of Arts and Letters".)
       The diversity figures are interesting as well.

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

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       Gospodinov on fiction in these times

       The Physics of Sorrow-author Georgi Gospodinov recently gave this year's Lancaster International Fiction Lecture, and at Words without Borders they now print What Fiction (Including in Translation) Can Do in Times Like Ours; there's video, too.
       Well worth a read (or view).

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

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       Bot review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of ... a book by the just-announced winner of this year's Austrian Book Prize, Clemens J. Setz's Gespräch ohne Autor, Bot -- a kind of chatbot-author-Q & A.

       I'm looking forward to / hoping for the ChatGPT (or the like) follow-up.

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

       Hamsun's Hunger and Pan

       Oxford World's Classics is bringing out new translations, by Terence Cave, of Knut Hamsun's Hunger and Pan (which I hope to see ...) -- see the publicity pages here and here -- and at the OUPblog Cave and Tore Rem write about Breakthrough and disgrace: Knut Hamsun's Hunger and Pan in retrospect
       As they note, Hamsun's "political affiliations and activities" were ... problematic -- though: "The Nobel committee was critical of the experimental qualities of Hamsun's works of the 1890s, but there is no sign that they reacted against his political ideas". (Hamsun was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920 -- and then infamously gifted the medal to Joseph Goebbels; he also wrote that short obituary of Adolf Hitler .....)

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       My Death review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Lisa Tuttle's 2004 novel, My Death, just out in a new edition from New York Review Books.

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

       Grand Prix Littéraire du Bénin

       They've announced the winner of the Grand Prix Littéraire du Bénin, and the literary prize went to the interesting-sounding drama Dans les limbes, by Florent Houndjo; see, for example, the 24 Heures au Bénin report, Florent Houndjo, lauréat du Grand Prix Littéraire.
       Who has English-language coverage -- including lots of pictures -- of this ? That's right, the official Chinese state news agency, Xinhua; see, for example, their report on how Benin honours winners of 5th edition of its biggest literature prize.

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       Kindred People's Literary Award

       The Estonian Kindred People's Literary Award has announced its winners, with the Livonian poetry collection Ēzkyrdiz vīzd by Ķempi Kārl (the pen name of Karl Pajusalu) taking the fiction prize; see also the EER report, Ķempi Kārl and Aado Lintrop receive Indigenous Peoples' Literature Award.

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       Dennis Cooper Q & A

       At The Guardian Anthony Cummins has a Q & A with Dennis Cooper: ‘I’m saddled with this cult writer thing’.
       Best line:

I was helping organise a Simon and Garfunkel benefit gig for Eugene McCarthy and secretly reading Sade, astonished.

       (He also notes: "It was reading Sade that made me want to try to work out how to use style to lure readers into being challenged to think about those dynamics" (between victimised and victimiser).)

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       'The new literature of Berlin' ?

       At El País Álex Vicente finds that: 'From Kirsty Bell to Vincenzo Latronico, several foreign authors are reflecting the changing identity of the German capital, a city marked by the rising cost of living and the traumatic weight of history', in Wild gentrification, undercurrents and sex work: This is the new literature of Berlin.

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

       Terms defining the (Japanese) times

       The annual issue of 現代用語の基礎知識 has come out and at nippon.com they report on the nominees for the Japanese words and phrases of the year, in Competitive Sports, Crime, and Climate Change: Japan’s Words of the Year for 2023.
       Always fun to see -- and including some (more or less) English-language words and phrases, including the bizarre アイム・ウェアリング・パンツ! (phonetically spelling out: 'I'm wearing pants!') and オーバーツーリズム ('overtourism').

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       Georges Perec's games

       I don't think my French is up to playing Georges Perec's games here, but this new publication sounds fun: Seuil has just brought out the collection Jeux; see their publicity page.

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

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       Beethoven's Assassins review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Andrew Crumey's recent novel, Beethoven's Assassins.

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

       Nordic Council Literature Prize

       They announced the winner of this year's Nordic Council Literature Prize, the leading Scandinavian-book prize, and it is Ihågkom oss till liv, a "genre-transcending" graphic novel/memoir by Joanna Rubin Dranger.
       See also the Albert Bonniers publicity page (with page samples) and the Bonnier Rights foreign rights page (with rights apparently sold for Arabic, Norwegian, and Spanish translations so far; English ? not so much ... (though several of her previous works have been published in English)). And the Swedish Book Review helpfully has a review, by B.J. Woodstein.

       I'm pretty sure we'll eventually get a US/UK edition of this; most Nordic Council Literature Prize-winners do get translated -- and quite a few of them are under review at the complete review.

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       Translation Prizes judges announced

       The Society of Authors has announced the judges for the eight 2023 Translation Prizes that will be awarded next year. (The number of prizes varies from year to year, as some are only biennial or triennial.)
       The shortlists for the prizes will be announced 1 December.

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

       Taiwan Literature Awards

       They've announced the winners of this year's Taiwan Literature Awards, with Chen Lieh's 殘骸書 winning the Golden Grand Laurel Award; see also the publisher's publicity page.
       It was selected from 191 submissions, with seven other titles winning Golden Book Awards, and three winning emerging-writer awards.

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

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       Sunday Times Literary Awards

       As Mila de Villiers reports, they've announced the winners of this year's (South African) Sunday Times Literary Awards, with How to be a Revolutionary, by C.A. Davids, winning in the fiction category; see also the Verso publicity page.

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       Governor General's Literary Awards finalists

       I missed this last week, but the Canada Council for the Arts has announced the finalists for this year's Governor General's Literary Awards, five titles each in seven categories, once for English-language books, once for French ones (including best translated books from English into French and vice versa).
       The 'GGs' are also notable -- and praiseworthy -- because they reveal what books were actually considered for each of these prizes -- as every literary prize should !

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       Donald Keene on 'The Japanese Classics'

       At nippon.com Janine Beichman offers the apparently previously unpublished 2012 speech by Donald Keene on 'The Japanese Classics', in Donald Keene: The Value of Reading Classics in Modern Translations.

       (Relatedly, see also Richard Nathan's report at Red Circle on yet another modern version by a renowned author of that greatest of Japanese classics, in Genji Shines Anew: Paperback edition of Mitsuyo Kakuta’s critically acclaimed ‘Tale of Genji’ adaptation released in Japan.)

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