opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

1 - 10 February 2025

1 February: Jenny Erpenbeck Q & A | Book markets 2024: UK - Austria
2 February: Han Kang profile | The Lily in the Valley review
3 February: Bhashavaad | Salome in Brooklyn
4 February: Oskar Pastior Preis | Hilary Mantel estate | Mahmoud Saeed (1939?-2025)
5 February: PEN Translates grants | Near Distance review
6 February: Com Lit 2BW | Kate Atkinson profile
7 February: Taiwan literature abroad | Geetanjali Shree Q & A
8 February: John Dos Passos Prize | Uketsu profile
9 February: 'Chinese contemporary literature in the Portuguese-speaking world' | Michael Dirda Q & A | Sunderland Lit and Phil Society
10 February: Tom Robbins (1932-2025) | First Love review

go to weblog

return to main archive

       Tom Robbins (1932-2025)

       Popular American author Tom Robbins has passed away; see, for example, the obituaries in The Los Angeles Times and at npr.
       Somewhat surprisingly, I haven't read any of his books.

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

---

       First Love review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Shimamoto Rio's Naoki Prize-winning novel, First Love, now in English, from Honford Star.

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

       'Chinese contemporary literature in the Portuguese-speaking world'

       In Humanities and Social Sciences Communications Xin Huang and Xiang Zhang report on Translating culture: the rise and resonance of Chinese contemporary literature in the Portuguese-speaking world, based on a total of 274 Chinese literary works translated into Portuguese between 1979 and 2024 -- of which: "nearly half consists of translations of classical Chinese antiquity".
       Also:

84 contemporary Chinese novels have found their way into Portuguese translation including 43 by Chinese mainland authors such as Liu Cixin, Su Tong, Yan Lianke, Mai Jia, Yu Hua, and Chen Zhongshi. Some works have multiple versions, showing the evolving landscape of Chinese literature in the Portuguese-speaking world.

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

---

       Michael Dirda Q & A

       At The Washington Post John Williams has a Q & A as Post critic Michael Dirda turns a page, as Dirda: "has decided to step away from his weekly cadence of reviewing".
       Among his observations:

W.H. Auden convinced me that writing snarky negative reviews -- which, by the way, is dead easy -- was bad for one’s character, so I’ve tried to avoid doing so as much as possible.

       And while I'm intrigued by the project that he describes as:

I’m trying to rework a long manuscript — currently 200,000 words — that is tentatively titled “The Great Age of Storytelling.” It focuses on popular fiction in Britain during the late 19th and early 20th centuries

       what I'm really looking forward to is: "a memoir about working at The Post".

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

---

       Sunderland Lit and Phil Society

       As reported at, for example, the BBC Literary society relaunches after 150 years.
       Apparently:

The original Lit and Phil Society closed its doors in 1873 after investing in the Athenaeum on Fawcett Street.

"Unfortunately, they bankrupted themselves," Ms Langley said.

"But the ideas lived on."

       Ah, yes.

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

       John Dos Passos Prize

       Longwood University has announced the winner of the John Dos Passos Prize -- awarded to: "a writer whose work offers incisive, original commentary on American themes, experiments with form and encompasses a range of human experiences" -- and it is Angie Cruz.
       None of her work is under review at the complete review.

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

---

       Uketsu profile

       Thu-Huong Ha profiles the Strange Pictures-author in the The Japan Times , in 'Uketsu': The internet phantom haunting Japan's bestseller lists (possibly paywalled ?) .
       Among the observations:

Uketsu believes that a key to his success is that his readers skew young, as young as children and teenagers, and he prides himself on hearing that for many readers, his novels are the first they’ve ever read.

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

       Taiwan literature abroad

       In New Lines Magazine James Baron finds Taiwan's Literature is Having a Moment in Central and Eastern Europe -- suggesting that the: 'Publication of contemporary fiction in Slavic languages is a sign of growing political support for Taipei'.
       See also the sites of publishers Mi:Lu -- 'a publisher of translated literature from Taiwan' -- and Safran -- 'an oriental publishing house, the first of its kind in Ukraine'.

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

---

       Geetanjali Shree Q & A

       At CNBC TV18 Sneha Bengani has a Q & A with Geetanjali Shree: 'Not just my writing, all literature is about protest'.
       Among her responses:

How can we revive Hindi, especially among the urban youth ?

You can't force a language down people's throats. If it comes as a state policy or just as a compulsory subject to be taught in schools, it is not going to work. It has to become a very natural, spontaneous part of our daily life

[...]

For the common people, we need to find ways to start enjoying the language more and make it a part of our daily life. But unfortunately, in our everyday lives, people like you and me use Hindi only when we talk to the shopkeepers, vegetable sellers, and gardeners. We speak it only in utilitarian conversations. That is not going to do great things for the language.

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

       Com Lit 2BW

       In LAist Julia Barajas wites about how Instead of banning AI, this UCLA literature class embraces it -- writing about COM LIT 2BW: Survey of Literature: Middle Ages to 17th Century.
       Elizabeth Landers notes that it's not all AI: "Everything has been guided by humans, checked by humans, imagined by humans".
       Meanwhile one student apparently: "appreciates an AI feature that turns sections of the Comp Lit 2BW textbook into podcasts".

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

---

       Kate Atkinson profile

       At El País Rafa de Miguel profiles Kate Atkinson, the unclassifiable bestseller: From crime fiction to the magical world of Yorkshire.

       The only Atkinson title under review at the complete review is Case Histories.

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

       PEN Translates grants

       English PEN has announced the latest batch of winners of its PEN Translates grants -- 19 titles, translated from 13 languages.
       Among the projects is a new translation of Yasutaka Tsutsui's Paprika.

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

---

       Near Distance review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Hanna Stoltenberg's Near Distance, now also out in a North American edition, from Biblioasis; it came out in the UK in 2023.

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

       Oskar Pastior Preis

       The Oskar Pastior Prize is a big-money (€40,000) but perhaps not so well-endowed literary prize, by the o du roher iasmin-author, awarded to an author whose work is 'in the tradition of the Wiener Gruppe, the Bielefelder Colloquium Neue Poesie, and the Oulipo'.
       Pastior had hoped for it to be awarded every two years, but the cash hasn't been there so so far they've only managed to award it in 2010 (to Oswald Egger), 2024 (Marcel Beyer), 2016 (Anselm Glück), and now, finally, again -- to Dagmara Kraus; see, for example, the Börsenblatt report.

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

---

       Hilary Mantel estate

       Apparently they're settling Hilary Mantel's estate, and so the numbers are out: she left it all to her husband, "having amassed a fortune of £4,677,327, which later reduced to a net sum of £4,182,353."; see, for example, the Daily Mail report.
       Not bad for an author.

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

---

       Mahmoud Saeed (1939?-2025)

       Iraqi author Mahmoud Saeed has passed away; see, for example, the Iraqi News Agency report or Thomas Frisbie's obituary in the Chicago Sun-Times.
       Several of his works have been translated into English, including Saddam City (see the Saqi publicity page) and The World Through the Eyes of Angels (see the Syracuse University Press publicity page).

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

       Bhashavaad

       Ashoka University has announced the launch of "India’s first non-profit, open-access, and crowd-sourced database of Indian translations", Bhashavaad -- already with more than 14,000 entries.
       Certainly, a useful resource.

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

---

       Salome in Brooklyn

       Having written the novel Salome in Graz I'm always curious about new Salome-variations, especially of the Wilde play and the Strauss opera, and tomorrow through 16 February Heartbeat Opera is putting on a new production, in a: "10-instrument orchestration by Dan Schlosberg" -- a lot smaller orchestra than Strauss had.
       Apparently theirs is a: "radical take on an iconic work" -- where: " it's not just about the severed heads but about the desires and cages that define us all". Not sure what the protagonists of my novel would make of that .....

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

       Han Kang profile

       Nobel laureate Han Kang has a new novel out -- We Do Not Part; I haven't seen it yet -- and at The Guardian Lisa Allardice has a profile of her, ‘I want to be hopeful’: Nobel prize-winning novelist Han Kang on the crisis in South Korea.

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

---

       The Lily in the Valley review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Honoré de Balzac's The Lily in the Valley, recently out in a new translation from New York Review Books.

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

       Jenny Erpenbeck Q & A

       In The Indian Express Aishwarya Khosla has a Q & A with the author at the Jaipur Literature Festival, in ‘All already in the Mahabharata’: Booker Prize winner Jenny Erpenbeck on war and human struggles.

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

---

       Book market 2024: UK

       The Bookseller has a couple of (presumably paywalled ?) 'Reviews of the Year' (2024), including for fiction sales and non-fiction sales in the UK in 2024.
       Non-fiction sales (as counted by BookScan) were down 6.3% by volume and 4.9% by value. Meanwhile, fiction sales were up 6.2% by volume and 9.8% by value.
       Of the top fourteen fiction categories twelve saw increases, with declines only in the categories: 'Graphic Novels: General' and 'War Fiction'. Meanwhile, 'Science Fiction and Fantasy' was up 41.35 -- a "TikTok/romantasy-aided" leap, apparently.
       I was surprised to see that the top non-fiction category was 'Food and Drink: General' -- generating almost twice as much cash as the also surprising runner-up, 'Travel and Holiday Guides: General'.

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

---

       Book market 2024: Austria

       The Hauptverband des Österreichischen Buchhandels has issued an overview (warning ! dreaded pdf format !) of the Austrian book market in 2024 -- albeit avoiding revealing a lot of the actual numbers.
       They do reveal that sales were up 3.1%, with turnover up 4.75.
       'Belletristik' -- basically, trade fiction -- turnover was up 9.7%.
       The Austrian market did better than the Swiss (1.3% more books sold) and German (1.7% fewer sales -- though turnover was up .8%, thanks to higher prices).
       The average price for a book was €16.27 -- up 1.5%, which was considerably less than the rate of inflation.

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

previous entries (21 - 31 January 2025)

archive index

- search the site -

- return to top of the page -

© 2025 the complete review


Main | the New | the Best | the Rest | Review Index | Links