opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

1 - 10 October 2024

1 October: Cercador Prize longlist | The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die review
2 October: (American) National Book Awards finalists | MacArthur Fellows | Prix Goncourt - deuxième sélection | T.S.Eliot Prize shortlist
3 October: Goldsmiths Prize shortlist | Comrade Papa review
4 October: Cundill Prize finalists | Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay Prize shortlist | William H. Gass centenary celebrations
5 October: Grand Prix SGDL | KulturPass numbers | Prix Hors Concours finalists
6 October: Olga Tokarczuk Q & A
7 October: Nobel Prize week | Robert Coover (1932-2024) | Suhrkamp takeover
8 October: Lore Segal (1928-2024) | Crossword Book Awards longlists
9 October: Profiles: Gerald Murnane - Jonathan Carroll | Grand prix de littérature américaine shortlist
10 October: The 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature goes to ... Han Kang | Prix Alain Spiess | Austrian Book Prize shortlist | Sally Rooney Q & A

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       The 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature goes to ... Han Kang

       They've announced that Han Kang will receive this year's Nobel Prize in Literature, "for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life"

       Two of her works are under review at the complete review:

• The Vegetarian
• The White Book

       She has an Official website; see also the RCW Literary Agency author page.

       There are quite a few interviews with her available online; see, for example:

• First reactions. Telephone interview, October 2024 - the Nobel interview
• Han Kang, the star author of South Korean literature, returns: ‘I stopped writing for a year and forgot how to do it’ by Berna González Harbour in El País (23/9/2023)
• Han Kang: ‘That will be a problem when I die – I won’t be able to finish all my ideas’ (profile) by Annabel Nugent in The Independent (7/5/2023)
• Han Kang: ‘If I was 100% healthy I couldn’t have become a writer’ by Hannah Beckerman in The Guardian (17/12/2017)
• Korea's Kafka ? Interview with Man Booker winner Han Kang by Sabine Peschel at Deutsche Welle (9/12/2016)
• Interview with Han Kang by Sarah Shin in The White Review (3/2016)
• Don't Be Fooled, 'The Vegetarian' Serves Up Appetites For Fright by Linda Wertheimer at npr (13/2/2016)
• Han Kang Interview by PP Wong at Banana Writers

       A new work of hers will conveniently be appearing in English in January in the US (and February in the UK), We Do Not Part, translated by e. yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris -- see the publicity pages from Hogarth and Hamish Hamilton, and pre-order your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.
       At Asymptote Linnea Gradin has an interesting -- and particularly relevant (translation into Swedish !) -- piece on Risgröt or juk ? On Han Kang’s We Do Not Part and Translating Between Small Languages

       For early reactions to her win, see:

• Han Kang Is Awarded Nobel Prize in Literature by Alex Marshall and Alexandra Alter in The New York Times
• South Korean author Han Kang wins the 2024 Nobel prize in literature by Ella Creamer in The Guardian
• South Korea's Han Kang wins Nobel Literature Prize by Annabel Rackham at the BBC
• South Korean author Han Kang wins 2024 Nobel Prize in literature by Neda Ulaby at npr

       More in-depth coverage should become available in the hours and days to come.

       To sample some of Han Kang's work, see:

• First Read — From “The White Book”
• White | State of Mind (excerpt from The White Book)
• The Vegetarian (excerpt)
• The Fruit of My Woman

       Han Kang also attended the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa, in 1998.

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

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       Prix Alain Spiess

       They've announced the winner of this year's prix Alain Spiess du deuxième roman, a French second-novel prize, and it is La nuit de David, by Abigail Assor; see, for example, the report at Livres Hebdo; see also the Gallimard publicity page.

       An English translation of her debut came out as As Rich as the King -- see the Pushkin Press publicity page -- so maybe we'll see this in English as well.

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       Austrian Book Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist for this year's Austrian Book Prize -- five titles left in the running.
       The winner will be announced 18 November.

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       Sally Rooney Q & A

       At The Paris Review's The Daily they have Loving the Limitations of the Novel: A Conversation between Sally Rooney and Merve Emre.
       Among her responses:

I started reading what you call the ordinary language philosophers. I read some J. L. Austin and Margaret MacDonald and made my way to the later work of Wittgenstein. I ended up reading Philosophical Investigations, and I felt, after I read it, that I knew how to finish Intermezzo.

       I have somehow managed to never come across a Rooney novel but I am intrigued and will certainly pick them up at some point.

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       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.

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

       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.

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

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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.

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

       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.

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

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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.

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

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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.

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

       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.

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

       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.

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

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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.

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

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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 .....)

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

       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.

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

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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.

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

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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.

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

       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.

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

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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.

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

       (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.

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

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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.

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

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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.

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

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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.

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

       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.

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

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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 .....

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

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