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opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review
Russian books (not) in Ukraine | The Family Idiot (Abridged Edition) review
Russian books (not) in Ukraine
Reuters reports that Ukraine withdraws 19 mln Russian, Soviet-era books from libraries.
Yes, "Some Ukrainian-language books from the Soviet era are also written off".
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
The Family Idiot (Abridged Edition) review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of An Abridged Edition of Jean-Paul Sartre's The Family Idiot: Gustave Flaubert, 1821-1857, abridged by Joseph S. Catalano, just out from the University of Chicago Press.
The complete version of this -- five volumes in the English translation -- is one of my literary white whales, but between trying to find a copy and making my way through the 2800+ pages, well, I haven't conquered it yet -- so I was particularly intrigued by this. Not least because of the sheer audacity of the undertaking -- the abridgement is radical, after all, cutting some nine-tenths of the original.
(I've read a ton of Sartre -- all the plays, most of the fiction, lots of the non-fiction, even The Freud Scenario (see the Verso publicity page) -- but I'm always astonished by how much more of his work there is still to get to.)
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Barbara Zitwer profile | New York Nocturne review
Barbara Zitwer profile
In The Korea Times Jack Lau profiles the head of the Barbara J. Zitwer Agency, in US literary agent reflects on personal journey to discover Korea in new book.
Among her observations:Zitwer blamed "old, big Korean publishers" for slowing Korean literature from reaching a foreign readership because they do not understand or wish to work with global publishing norms and insist on their ways. For that, authors from South Korea have lost out on opportunities for their works to be published or even adapted for the screen.Quite a few of the works she has represented are under review at the complete review.
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New York Nocturne review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Walter Satterthwait's New York Nocturne: The Return of Miss Lizzie.
This came out in German a decade before it was published (in 2016) in the original English -- not the first of Satterthwait's novel to go that route; Perfection did, too.
Walter Satterthwait did publish quite a lot -- including the Joshua Croft-series -- and is a relatively well-known mystery writer, so I was surprised to see that there is no (English) Wikipedia page for him -- the highest-profile English-writing author I think I've come across without one. (There are, however, German and French Wikipedia pages for him.)
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Classics at the Bodleian Library | Forthcoming Murakami novel
Classics at the Bodleian Library
At Antigone Classics Librarian for the Bodleian Library in the University of Oxford Charlotte Goodall looks back at Tempora Mutantur: Two Decades as a Classics Librarian.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Forthcoming Murakami novel
Japanese publisher Shinchosha has announced that there is a new Murakami Haruki novel due out -- but beyond the publication date of 13 April there's not much information about it yet, not even the title.
The reports about it are corrspondingly thin, but see, for example, those in The Japan Times and at Asahi Shimbun.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Wingate Prize shortlist | Publishing Hindi literature
Wingate Prize shortlist
They've announced the shortlist for this year's Wingate Prize, "given to the best book, fiction or non-fiction, to translate the idea of Jewishness to the general reader".
The shortlist consists of four works of fiction and three of non.
Two of the works are under review at the complete review: The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk and The Memory Monster by Yishai Sarid.
The winner will be announced on 12 March.
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Publishing Hindi literature
At mint lounge Aditya Mani Jha looks at how English publishing in India is finally discovering the world of Hindi literature.
Among the observations:Things are improving, broadly speaking, but the rate of growth is still relatively small. Penguin acquired the legacy Hindi publisher Hind Pocket Books in 2018. Other publishers are also amping up their Hindi output, slowly but steadily. Is it too much to hope for, the notion that Hindi and English publishers would work in tandem in the near future, releasing bilingual editions, perhaps embarking on joint editorial sessions ?
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Libris Literatuur Prijs longlist
Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Siblings review
Libris Literatuur Prijs longlist
They've announced the longlist for this year's Libris Literatuur Prijs, a leading Dutch literary prize.
There are eighteen titles left in the running -- selected from 235 submitted titles. (Yes, admirably they reveal what all the titles in the running are -- unlike most English-language book prizes, which outrageously insist on keeping secret what titles were actually considered for the prize. Why can't you do this, The Booker Prizes ? Look how easy it is !)
The shortlist will be announced on 6 March, and the winner of 8 May.
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Victorian Premier's Literary Awards
They've announced the winners of this year's Victorian Premier's Literary Awards -- "which includes Australia's single richest literary award".
Jessica Au's Cold Enough for Snow won both the Victorian Prize for Literature and the Prize for Fiction. This came out from New Directions in the US and Fitzcarraldo Editions in the UK (and Giramondo in Australia), as the first winner of The Novel Prize.
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Siblings review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Brigitte Reimann's 1963 novel Siblings, the first of her works of fiction to be translated into English -- just out in the UK from Penguin Classics and out in the US next month from Transit Books. (It's also out in a new German edition.)
At Deutsche Welle Elizabeth Grenier now also writes about how Cult East German novelist now published in English.
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Ockham New Zealand Book Awards longlists
Gina Apostol on José Rizal | Deceit review
Ockham New Zealand Book Awards longlists
They've announced the longlists for this year's Ockham New Zealand Book Awards, with 44 titles longlisted in the four categories, selected from 191 entries.
The shortlists will be announced 8 March, and the winners on 17 May.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Gina Apostol on José Rizal
At the Los Angeles Review of Books The Revolution According to Raymundo Mata-author Gina Apostol writes on Let the Knife Speak: On José Rizal.
She suggests:The Dutchman Multatuli and Brazil’s Machado de Assis are his nearest confreres, but as an experimental novelist making political art in his colonizer’s tongue, he is Original Gangster: sui generis, perhaps because he so adamantly centered himself, his being Filipino -- that is, an artist of many worlds and tongues.(See also reviews of, for example, Multatuli's Max Havelaar and Machado de Assis' The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas.)
Reviews of Rizal's Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo are consistently among the most popular at the complete review -- though the novels are still far too little known and read outside of the Philippines.
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Deceit review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Yuri Felsen's 1930 novel, Deceit.
This came out from Prototype in the UK last year, and is now out from Astra House in the US.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
PEN Translates winners | NBCC Awards finalists | Folio Prize shortlists
PEN Translates winners
English PEN has announced the latest PEN Translates winners -- grants for translations awarded for 15 titles from 14 countries and 10 languages.
Certainly some promising-sounding titles to look forward to here.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
NBCC Awards finalists
The National Book Critics Circle has announced the finalists for its 2022 awards -- five books each in six categories.
One title in the Fiction category is under review at the complete review -- Kawakami Mieko's All the Lovers in the Night -- as are two finalists for the Gregg Barrios Book in Translation Prize, The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, in Jennifer Croft's translation, and Grey Bees by Andrey Kurkov, in Boris Dralyuk's translation.
The winners will be announced on 23 March.
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Folio Prize shortlists
They've announced the shortlists for the Rathbones Folio Prize 2023 -- five titles in each of the three categories, fiction, non, and poetry.
The category winners and Book of the Year will be announced 27 March.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Dublin Literary Award longlist | Eliot-Hale letters | Dead Lions review
Dublin Literary Award longlist
They've announced the longlist for this year's Dublin Literary Award; see also the list (warning ! dreaded pdf format !) of all the titles.
This is the well-endowed novel-prize where libraries from around (some of) the world -- 84 this time around -- nominate novels written in or translated into English -- 70 this year, of which 29 are novels in translation.
Nine of the titles are under review at the complete review:The shortlist will be announced on 28 March, and the winner on 25 May.
- The Anomaly by Hervé Le Tellier
- Brisbane by Eugene Vodolazkin
- Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet
- Grand Hotel Europa by Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer
- The Morning Star by Karl Ove Knausgaard
- The Sentence by Louise Erdrich
- Time Shelter by Georgi Gospodinov
- Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree
- Where You Come From by Saša Stanišićby
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Eliot-Hale letters
They've released The Letters of T.S.Eliot to Emily Hale in a free-to-access digital edition.
For some background, see Michelle Taylor on The Secret History of T.S.Eliot's Muse in The New Yorker and Insights from the unsealed T.S. Eliot, Emily Hale letters, one year later at the Princeton University Library.
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Dead Lions review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of the second in Mick Herron's now-also-a-TV-series Slough House series, Dead Lions.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Cairo International Book Fair | Ruth Ozeki Q & A
Cairo International Book Fair
The Cairo International Book Fair runs through 6 February, and at ahramonline Dina Ezzat reports about The 54th Cairo International Book Fair: Greater demand for non-fiction among this year's trends.
Disappointing to hear that:The domination of fiction during over 20 years, which allowed for many new novelists to make an imprint on the contemporary Egyptian and Arab literature scene, is being challenged.But at least numerous fiction titles also get some attention.
This year, publishers say there is a growing interest in non-fiction, old and new titles alike.
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Ruth Ozeki Q & A
At Scroll.in Sayari Debnath has: "An interview with author Ruth Ozeki about her faith, the important exercise of looking at one’s face, the deep relationship one forms with objects, and more", in ‘I turned my impatience into something useful’: Ruth Ozeki, winner of 2022 Women’s Prize for Fiction..
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Japanese books in translation in 2023 | Hindi and Urdu translation Q & A
Japanese books in translation in 2023
In The Japan Times Iain Maloney offers an overview of Translations and books about Japan for your 2023 reading list.
Quite a few titles of interest on the horizon, including works by Kawabata, Tanizaki, and Dazai Osamu, as well a "656-page tale spanning a century" by Yu Miri.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Hindi and Urdu translation Q & A
At India Blooms "Yatish Kumar, conducted an hour-long lively discussion on translating from Hindi and Urdu to English with Daisy Rockwell, Baran Farooqi and Poonam Saxena", in Kolkata Litfest: A tete-a-tete with eminent translators of Hindi and Urdu literature.
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Writing in ... Iran | 'Book Twitter' | Albertine Translation Prizes
Das Mädchen auf der Lotosblume review
Writing in ... Iran
At Qantara.de Gerrit Wustmann writes about Iranian literature in times of uprising -- noting that:Reading books written by Iranian women authors over recent decades, you can plainly see the upheavals and eruptions growing larger and more forceful; you can see how much has been bottled up over time. It was very clear that at some point, all this would light a revolutionary spark.See also the Iranian literature under review at the complete review.
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'Book Twitter'
In Esquire Sophie Vershbow looks Inside Book Twitter's Final(?) Days, wondering whether the exodus of authors after the Elon Musk takeover of the platform will lead to the demise of that community.
I thought 'BookTok' was where it was at now .....
(I am on Twitter, and have for the most part found it basically as useful and/or not as before.)
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Albertine Translation Prize
They've announced the winners of the first Albertine Translation Prize, honoring: "the best contemporary French literature in English translation", selected from the twenty-two works that received Albertine Translation grants.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Das Mädchen auf der Lotosblume review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of two early unfinished novels by Brigitte Reimann, collected in Das Mädchen auf der Lotosblume.
Her novel Siblings is coming out in English shortly -- from Penguin Classics in the UK and Transit Books in the US --, the first of her fiction to be translated into English, and I should be getting to it shortly. But of course what I really want to see now is the recently discovered and published Die Denunziantin; see the Aisthesis publicity page.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
John Dos Passos Prize | Dylan Thomas Prize longlist
John Dos Passos Prize
They've announced that Carolina De Robertis has been named the 2022 winner of the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, awarded: "to a talented American writer who experiments with form, explores a range of voices and deserves more recognition".
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Dylan Thomas Prize longlist
They've announced the longlist for this year's Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize, awarded: "for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged 39 or under".
There are twelve titles on the longlist; I haven't seen any of them.
The shortlist will be announced 23 March, and the winner will be announced on 11 May.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Icelandic Literary Prizes | Publishing lost classics
Svetlana Alexievich Q & A | Prix Sade longlist
Bookselling in ... Egypt | The Revolt of the Animals review
Icelandic Literary Prizes
They awarded the Icelandic Literary Prizes on Tuesday, with the Icelandic president handing out the awards; see, for example, the Iceland Review report.
The fiction prize went to Lungu, by Pedro Gunnlaugur Garcia; see also the Bjartur publicity page.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Publishing lost classics
In Prospect editor at McNally Editions -- "a paperback line devoted to hidden gems" -- Lucy Scholes writes about how: "There’s a growing band of people digging through library stacks and second-hand bookshops in search of lost classics", in Meet the archive moles.
It's great to see these publishers and imprints get more attention, from Faber Editions to Boiler House Press' Recovered Books-series and Handheld Press. (And. of course, there are many others -- not least New York Review Classics.)
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Svetlana Alexievich Q & A
In the Asahi Shimbun Akira Nemoto has a Q & A with the Nobel laureate, in Svetlana Alexievich: Literature can prevent humans from becoming savage beasts
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Prix Sade longlist
They've announced the longlist of this year's prix Sade -- always an interesting selection; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Bookselling in ... Egypt
At the BBC Yolande Knell and Wael Hussein report that Egyptians offered loans to buy books as inflation soars.
Among the interesting/disturbing titbits:With book prices more than doubling, some Egyptian authors say they have cut back on characters and descriptions to be more economical in their writing.And:Some Egyptian novelists have described ways they have stripped back their writing to produce shorter books -- simplifying storylines by introducing fewer minor characters and limiting the amount of description.Meanwhile authors also: "complain that more Egyptian readers are now buying counterfeit copies of books of low quality".
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
The Revolt of the Animals review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Nobel laureate Władysław Reymont's 1924 novel, The Revolt of the Animals, now also out in English, from Glagoslav
Reymont isn't among the more widely-read Nobel laureates, but with a new translation of his most famous work, The Peasants, out in a new translation, by Anna Zaranko, from Penguin Classics -- see their publicity page -- he's been getting some more attention recently, and it's good to see this one finally in English as well.
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Longlists: IPAF - Republic of Consciousness Prize - US/Canada - جایزه ابوالحسن نجفی
Longlist: IPAF
They've announced the longlist for this year's International Prize for Arabic Fiction, the leading Arabic-language novel prize.
Sixteen titles are in the running, selected from 124 submissions
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Longlist: Republic of Consciousness Prize - US/Canada
The British Republic of Consciousness Prize has been awarded since 2017; now there is a US/Canada version, and they have announced their inaugural longlist -- ten titles from small publishers of literary fiction.
Several of the longlisted works are translations; none are under review at the complete review yet.
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Longlist: جایزه ابوالحسن نجفی
They've announced the longlist for this year's Abolhassan Najafi Award, an Iranian award for the best translation of a work into Persian; see, for example, the Tehran Times report.
Among the nine finalists are translations of Michel Houellebecq's The Map and the Territory and Marina Lewycka's A Short History of Tractors in Ukraine, as well as Nathanael West's The Day of the Locust, Elias Khoury's Gate of the Sun, and Émile Zola's Thérèse Raquin.
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Transgressive literature | After Sappho review
Transgressive literature
In GQ Barry Pierce finds that 'The Shards' is Bret Easton Ellis's tamest book yet. When did literature lose its nerve ? (See also my review of The Shards.)
Pierce does note that: "Samuel Delany is still fighting the good fight and producing some absolutely insane smut but he has been relegated to essentially self-publishing" -- and wonders:Is the audience there for transgressive literature now ? Or, to revisit my opening question, can it exist in a culture that seems obsessed with obedience ?Times do seem fairly tame -- though the spate of newly-translated Vladimir Sorokin novels surely qualify as good-ol' transgressive fiction.
(A fair number of transgressive novels are under review at the complete review, from the Marquis de Sade's The 120 Days of Sodom to the Urs Allemann novel Pierce mentions.)
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After Sappho review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Selby Wynn Schwartz's Booker Prize-longlisted novel, After Sappho, now also out -- today ! -- in a US edition, from Liveright.
(Posted by: M.A.Orthofer) - permanent link -
Daisy Rockwell Q & A | Most popular used books in Germany
Daisy Rockwell Q & A
At The Wire Jey Sushil has a Q & A with Tomb of Sand-translator Daisy Rockwell, in Interview: 'Maybe Some Things Are Lost in Translation but So Much Is Found'.
Interesting to hear her discuss the differences between translating from Hindi and from Urdu:It is different and at many levels. It is the same grammar and everything, but I will tell you what’s different though. Hindi is much more experimental and messy.(Updated - 25 January 2023): See now also An Interview with Daisy Rockwell by Shree Thaarshini at The Oxonian Review.
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Most popular used books in Germany
German online seller momox has published their annual list of the most-sold used books (and CDs and DVDs), with six of the seven Harry Potter-novels -- all except the first -- making the top ten.
Karsten Dusse's Achtsam morden -- see also the Heyne publicity page -- was the most popular title. (This has been translated into a lot of languages but not English.)
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Bestselling authors in France in 2022 | Prix Émile Guimet
Bestselling authors in France in 2022
Le Figaro has their annual overview of the bestselling (in France) French authors -- sales of all their books in 2022 -- and while the article itself paywalled, a screenshot at least gives some insight -- and numbers, including the top five:
- Guillaume Musso (e.g. The Reunion) - 1,383,258 copies sold
- Joël Dicker (The Enigma of Room 622, etc.) - 998,477
- Mé́lissa Da Costa - 844, 547
- Virginie Grimaldi - 819.584
- Pierre Lemaitre (The Great Swindle, etc.) - 779,517
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Prix Émile Guimet
They've announced the winner of this year's prix Émile Guimet de littérature asiatique, a French literary prize for a best translated book by an Asian author, and it is Latitudes of Longing, by Shubhangi Swarup; see also the One World publicity page.
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PEN America Literary Awards longlists | New Asymptote
Masquerade and the Nameless Women review
PEN America Literary Awards longlists
PEN America has announced the longlists for this year's Literary Awards.
Lots of categories, including the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation and the PEN Translation Prize. I have several of these but haven't reviewed any yet; the only longlisted title under review at the complete review is Translating Myself and Others by Jhumpa Lahiri, longlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay.
The winners will be announced on 2 March.
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New Asymptote
The January issue of Asymptote is now up.
The usual large variety of material -- and a lot of it, not least interviews with How I became a Nun-author César Aira and Tomb of Sand-author Geetanjali Shree.
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Masquerade and the Nameless Women review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Mikage Eiji's Masquerade and the Nameless Women.
This came out from Vertical, who have published a lot of Japanese popular fiction -- always interesting to see.
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Japanese literary prizes | Edgar® Awards finalists
Baillie Gifford best-of award
Japanese literary prizes
The leading Japanese literary prizes, the Akutagawa and the Naoki Prizes, are biannual, announced twice a year, and they've now announced the most recent batch of winners -- doubling down with both prizes having co-winners this time around; see for example mentions here and here.
The Akutagawa Prize went to Sato Atsushi for 荒地の家族 ('Families of the Wasteland'; see also the Shinchosha publicity page) and Idogawa Iko for この世の喜びよ ('Joy of the World'; see also the Kodansha publicity page). (The American contender -- see my previous mention -- fell short.)
The Naoki Prize went to Ogawa Satoshi for 地図と拳 ('Map and Fist'; see also the Shueisha publicity page ) and Chihaya Akane for しろがねの葉 ('Shirogane Leaf'; see also the Shinchosha publicity page).
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Edgar® Awards finalists
The Mystery Writers of America have announced the finalists for this year's Edgar Allan Poe Awards.
Lots of categories -- but I haven't seen any of these.
The winners will be announced 27 April.
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Baillie Gifford best-of award
The Baillie Gifford Prize, a leading non-fiction prize, has announced that it is celebrating its 25th anniversary with a best-of prize, pitting the winners from 1999 to 2022 against each other.
During most of this time (1999 to 2015) this prize was known as the Samuel Johnson Prize; the only winning title under review at the complete review is Jonathan Coe's B.S.Johnson-biography, Like a Fiery Elephant.
The winner will be announced on 27 April.
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Literature from ... Japan | National Jewish Book Awards
die verbesserung von mitteleuropa, roman review
Literature from ... Japan
At The Federal Nawaid Anjum looks at What has led to the great resurgence of literature from Japan.
There is, of course, quite a bit of Japanese literature under review at the complete review.
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National Jewish Book Awards
The Jewish Book Council has announced the winners of this year's (American) National Jewish Book Awards; there are many, many categories.
The Hebrew Fiction in Translation category was won by Love by Maayan Eitan, in the author's own translation.
The Fiction category winner was Signal Fires, by Dani Shapiro.
Koshersoul by Michael W. Twitty was named Jewish Book of the Year.
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die verbesserung von mitteleuropa, roman review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Oswald Wiener's 1969 novel, die verbesserung von mitteleuropa, roman.
This is among the most significant post-war German works of fiction that hasn't yet been translated into English -- though admittedly not a very widely-read one. As I have mentioned before, this strikes me as the ultimate Dalkey Archive Press title -- I'm surprised they haven't had a go at it.
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American Akutagawa contender ? | Wortmeldungen-Literaturpreis shortlist
American Akutagawa contender ?
They're announcing the winner of the 168th round of the Akutagawa Prize -- the leading Japanese literary prize (with sixteen winning titles under review at the complete review), and among the finalists is グレゴリー・ケズナジャット, with his story 開墾地 (see also the Kodansha publicity page). That would be Gregory Khezrnejat -- leading Thu-Huong Ha to ask in The Japan Times Could the Akutagawa Prize get its first American winner ?
He wouldn't be the first foreign-born winner -- Li Kotomi won just two years ago -- and he's certainly not the first American to publish a work in Japanese -- see, for example, Hideo Levy's A Room Where the Star-Spangled Banner Cannot Be Heard. Still, this is certainly something to watch.
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Wortmeldungen-Literaturpreis shortlist
They've announced the shortlist for this year's Wortmeldungen literary prize, a €35,000 prize for a short critical German text -- between 8 and 25 pages in length --, making it one of the richest literary prizes going, in prize-money-per-word terms.
Finalists include texts by Atlas of Remote Islands-author Judith Schalansky and Mörikes Schlüsselbein-author Olga Martynova; all five texts can be read via the links on the announcement-page.
The winning text will be announced in March.
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