opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

       Stefan Tobler Q & A

       At new books in german Regan Mies has a Q & A with teh translator and And Other Stories founder, in Putting Words First: an interview with Publisher and Translator Stefan Tobler.
       Among his responses -- sales numbers ! as he notes that Yuri Herrera's Signs Preceding the End of the World sold 13,000 copies last year.

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       臺灣文學獎

       They announced the winners of this year's Taiwan Literature Awards a few weeks ago and the winners got to pick up their prizes on Saturday; see, for example, the Taiwan Today report 2024 Taiwan Literature Awards winners recognized.
       The prizes are awarded in Indigenous languages, Taiwanese, and Hakka.

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       Pope endorses reading

       The head of the Catholic Church, Jorge Mario Bergoglio -- popularly known as 'Francis' -- is known for being a reader of literature and it's good to see him continuing to spread the word: his most recent letter is the Letter of His Holiness Pope Francis on the Role of Literature in Formation.
       Among the authors he mentions and quotes are Borges (of course), T.S.Eliot, and Proust -- and he closes with a quote from Paul Celan.

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       Theater in ... Ukraine

       At Deutsche Welle Anna Chaika explores: Why is Ukraine's theater scene thriving amid war ? -- as it apparently is.

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       'Coming of age'-books

       At The Guardian they have a number of authors 'recall their formative reading experiences', in: ‘A rumpled paperback showed me I was not alone’: Charlotte Mendelson, Michael Rosen and others on the books that marked their coming of age.
       Always a fun exercise.

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       Book- vs. movie-titles

       A bit more interesting than the usual book vs. movie-adaptation debate: at Screen Rant Ben Sherlock suggests: 10 Movie Adaptations With Better Titles Than The Books They're Based On.

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       Banned in Utah public schools

       As Carmen Nesbitt reports in The Salt Lake Tribune: It’s official: These 13 books are now banned from all public schools in Utah
       Yes, 'in accordance with §53G-10-103 and having met the statewide threshold of removal from 3 districts OR 2 districts and 3 charters', thirteen titles fall foul as Objective Sensitive Material and are now banned; see also the Utah State Board of Education's list (to which, I suspect, many, many titles will soon be added ...).
       Poor Sarah J. Maas dominates the list, with six of the thirteen titles, but Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake and 2017 National Book Awards finalist (in the Young People's Literature category) What Girls are Made of, by Elana K. Arnold, also make the cut. Judy Blume's Forever, too !
       So what is too 'sensitive' for Utah schoolkids ? Helpfully, the Board of Education has a Sensitive Materials Flow Chart (warning ! dreaded pdf format !), so you too can determine what should be banned ! (I can't wait for the board game version -- fun for the whole family !)
       Apparently, it's (human) genitals and genital-related activity that are the tripwires: descriptions or depictions of: "human genitals in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal", "acts of human masturbation, sexual intercourse, or sodomy", and "fondling or other erotic touching of human genitals or pubic region" are the no-nos. (Interestingly, animal genitalia, masturbation, sodomy, etc. are apparently no problem -- presumably the lawmakers figured kids see all that down on the farm, so it's no big deal .....)
       (And you have to appreciate that they define the terms "description" and "depiction" (with wholesome examples from C.S.Lewis, and E.B.White's Charlotte's Web; surely something involving genitalia would have been more on point ...).)

       The obscenity of this is, of course, beyond words; I pity the poor kids of Utah; they deserve better. But fortunately they now have a convenient list of titles which are guaranteed to have genital-related content, should they be interested, and these shouldn't be too hard for them to get their hands on, even in Utah.

       (I count myself lucky, certainly at least in this regard, to have grown up in 1970s New York City, where I could buy, as a very young teen, The Anarchist Cookbook and the fat Grove paperbacks -- still the mass-market-paperback editions ! -- of de Sade's work (and even more dubious Grove titles) at the local Barnes & Noble, the original store on 18th and Fifth, without anyone batting an eye.)

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       Caine Prize shortlist

       They've announced the five-title-strong shortlist for this year's Caine Prize for African Writing, the leading African story-prize.
       The titles were selected from over two eligible hundred stories (out of 320 entries), by authors from twenty-eight countries.
       The winner will be announced 17 September.

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       Miles Franklin Award

       They've announced the winner of this year's Miles Franklin Literary Award, the leading Australian novel award, and it is Praiseworthy, by Alexis Wright.
       See also the publicity pages from Giramondo, New Directions, and And Other Stories, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.
       This was the most noteworthy omission from this year's just-announced Booker Prize longlist -- see my previous mention -- though of course we have no way of knowing whether it was actually submitted for the prize, since they don't release the list of titles actually considered .....
       I do have a copy of this and am looking forward to getting to it.

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       Annie Le Brun (1942-2024)

       Annie Le Brun has passed away -- as Guillaume Lecaplain and Clémence Mary write in Libération, Annie Le Brun, mort de la dernière des surréalistes.
       Several of her works have been translated into English -- including Sade: A Sudden Abyss; see also the City Lights publicity page.
       See also Karl Pollin-Dubois' From the Heart of the Void: A Conversation with Annie Le Brun in World Literature Today from 2019.

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       Cundill History Prize longlist

       They've announced the longlist for this year's Cundill History Prize -- thirteen titles.
       The shortlist will be announced 5 September.

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       Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

       In his review of them in the new London Review of Books A.W.Moore notes:

We now have three new English translations: by Michael Beaney for Oxford, Alexander Booth for Penguin and Damion Searls for Norton. (A fourth, by David Stern, Katia Saporiti and Joachim Schulte for Cambridge, is forthcoming.) The book came out of copyright in 2021 (seventy years after Wittgenstein's death), which is the reason new translation is possible. But it's another matter whether such a thing is desirable.

       (I only have the Searls translation -- as well as several editions of the German original.)
       Moore also notes:

First,​ this book is not just a work of philosophy, it is a work of art.

       And::

Second, thanks to the concern that the Tractatus has with language, it is a contribution to its own subject matter. Its translators must therefore ensure that their English version does not stand in overt tension with whatever messages about language Wittgenstein is attempting to convey.

       The Tractatus is, of course, endlessly fascinating, and any (attempts at) translation of it all the more so; I hope to get some coverage up myself, as well.

       Wittgenstein also figures, peripherally but repeatedly, in my novel Salome in Graz, for a variety of reasons -- and a Tractatus-nod at the end was impossible to resist, not least because, just as there are seven veils to Salome's dance in both Wilde's play and Strauss' opera, the Tractatus is structured around seven propositions.
       Wittgenstein (and his thought) were also an obvious fit with the main themes of the novel -- storytelling and translation (and language more generally). And while the personal connection -- Strauss was a visitor to the Wittgenstein-home, and apparently played piano-duets with Ludwig's brother, Paul (who then lost an arm in the war), so Ludwig likely had met and known him -- isn't really addressed, there is the amusing story of Wittgenstein's only known reaction to Strauss' Salome (and my philosopher-protagonist's ... creative interpretation of that).

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       Pushkin Press acquires Gallic Books' list

       As The Bookseller reports, Pushkin Press expands further with acquisition of Gallic Books' list, as Pushkin Press has acquired Gallic Books' list of titles, with Gallic apparently winding down at the end of the year.
       Muriel Barbery's The Elegance of the Hedgehog -- and her other titles -- is probably considered the big prize here, but to my mind the real treasure is the Pascal Garnier-list -- books such as How's the Pain ?.

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       The Goldenacre review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Philip Miller's The Goldenacre.

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       Booker Prize longlist

       They've announced the thirteen-title longlist for this year's Booker Prize -- which touts itself as: "the world's most influential prize for a single work of fiction" --, selected from 156 (unfortunately not revealed) titles.
       American-heavy, the list also features an also-English-writing Dutch author, Yael van der Wouden, with The Safekeep; see also the publicity pages from Viking and Avid Reader Press.
       I haven't seen any of these .....

       The shortlist will be announced 16 September, and the winner on 12 November.

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       Abdulrazak Gurnah in Swahili

       At African Arguments Karen Chalamilla has a Q & A with Mkuki Bgoya, the managing director of Tanzanian publisher Mkuki na Nyota, who have published a Swahili translation of Nobel laureate Abdulrazak Gurnah's Paradise -- see their publicity page -- in Mkuki Bgoya: “Swahili writers should be mandatory reading in Tanzania, but there’s a deep trauma around books”.
       Among his comments:

I also wish more writers who submitted just wrote in Swahili. We get a lot of people writing terribly in English instead of the language they’re comfortable with, thinking it will increase their chances of getting published.

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       Eisner Awards

       They've announced the winners of this year's Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards -- given out in thirty-two categories.

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       Rejtő Jenő profile

       At hlo Hanna Zelma Horányi profiles Jenő Rejtő: Dirty Fred, the Captain -- author also of Quarantine in the Grand Hotel.

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       The Utopian Generation review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Pepetela's 1992 novel The Utopian Generation, finally coming out in English, from Biblioasis.

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       Edna O'Brien (1930-2024)

       Irish author Edna O'Brien has passed away; see, for example, Richard Lea's obituary in The Guardian.

       None of her work is under review at the complete review, but see her books published by Picador and Faber.

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       Mick Herron profile

       At The Guardian Alex Clark profiles the The Secret Hours-author, in Mick Herron: ‘Most people didn’t know I was writing – I was a secretive kind of writer’ as his first novel, Down Cemetery Road is now also being adapted for TV; see also the Apple TV press release.

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       Kehlmann on Perutz

       Daniel Kehlmann has a new book coming out this fall, Daniel Kehlmann über Leo Perutz -- see the Kiepenheuer & Witsch publicity page -- and of course any work touting Perutz is welcome. (Pushkin Press has published several of his books.)
       This is part of a new-to-me series, edited by Volker Weidermann, Bücher meines Lebens -- 'Books of my life' -- where well-known German-writing authors write about authors (not books ...) highly regarded by them. Other volumes include Jenny Erpenbeck on Christine Lavant and Clemens Meyer on Christa Wolf; I look forward to seeing some of these.

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       Ovid's Heroides

       A University of Kansas press release suggests that a New translation of Ovid’s ‘Heroides’ offers insight into ‘ancient fan fiction’; see also the Hackett Classics publicity page for the new translation.
       (There's also a Loeb edition -- an older translation --; see the Harvard University Press publicity page.)

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       TikTok Book Awards

       They've announced the winners of this year's TikTok Book Awards; see, for example, Lucy Acheson's BBC report.
       From what I hear, 'BookTok' is incredibly popular; I'm afraid I still don't have the patience to watch this kind of stuff (well, pretty much anything for that matter) online (I remain a text person, through and through), and I am not familiar with the award winners -- neither the BookTokers nor the books ....

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       Sinan Antoon profile

       At The New Arab Sarah Shaffi profiles the The Book of Collateral Damage-author, in Echoing Palestinian perseverance: Iraqi novelist Sinan Antoon on NYU Gaza protests arrest and upcoming translation of Palestinian story.

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       Veza-Canetti-Preis

       The city of Vienna has announced the winner of this year's Veza Canetti Prize, a €10,000 author-award for a female Austrian author, and it is Karin Peschka.

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       Reading in ... the UK

       The Reading Agency has issued their 'The State of the Nation's Adult Reading: 2024 Report', reporting on the results of a survey conducted 2 to 4 April of 2003 people in the UK 16 and older -- see their summary or the full report (warning ! dreaded pdf format !).
       Only 50% of respondents report reading for pleasure any longer -- down from 58% in 2015 -- with 24% of those aged 16-24 saying they were never regular readers, while an astonishing 44% in that age group are 'lapsed readers', having given up on it.
       Interestingly, 55% of respondents reported borrowing books from their local library (16% doing so once a week)
       Oddly, while only 50% report reading for pleasure, 52% say: "they enjoy visiting a bookshop or library" .....

       (Hey, at least this is all (slightly) more than just anecdotal; for a really silly why-aren't-they/we-reading-? (non-)thought piece, see Georgina Elliott at Dazed exploring the tough question(s) of ... uh, Why don't straight men read novels ?)

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       Lewis Lapham (1935-2024)

       Much-admired editor -- of Harper's and Lapham's Quarterly -- Lewis Lapham has passed away; see, for example the mention at Lapham's Quarterly or Robert D. McFadden's obituary in The New York Times (presumably paywalled).

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       Hillbilly Elegy dumped by German publisher

       The German publisher of Hillbilly Elegy -- the bestseller written by American vice-presidential candidate (for now) J.D.Vance --, Ullstein, has declined to renew the license for the German edition of the book (i.e. they no longer wanted to be tainted by association with it and what its author has come to represent); see, for example, Florian Kappelsberger's report in Der Spiegel.
       A new edition will now be brought out by some new and not quite as illustrious outfit called YES

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       The Understory review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Thai author Saneh Sangsuk's novel The Understory -- out from Peirene in the UK last year, and Deep Vellum in the US earlier this year.

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       Lev Grossman Q & A

       Lev Grossman's The Bright Sword is now out, and at the Literary Hub Jane Ciabattari has a Q & A with the author, in Lev Grossman on Adapting Arthurian Legends for a World in Turmoil.

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       Proust and translation

       At the drift Simon Leser considers 'Proust in the Age of Retranslation', in Time and Time Again -- well worth a look.

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       New Saudi novel prize

       The Saudi General Entertainment Authority has announced a new 'Golden Pen Award for the Most Influential Literature', focusing: "on the most popular novels with the highest potential for adaptation into films", whereby the: "first and second place winning novels will be adapted into films". There will also be a 'Best Screenplay Adapted from a Literary Work' -- where, again: "the first and second place screenplays will be adapted into films".
       The prize money is good, too -- the main novel and screenplay prizes pay out US$100,000 to the winners, and US$50,000 to the second-place titles; novel category winners -- there are eight, including Best Comedy Novel and Best Historical Novel -- each get US$25,000. And there's even a translated novel-category -- also paying the winner US$100,000.

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       A Maggot review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of John Fowles' strange 1985 novel, A Maggot.

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       PEN Translates winners

       English PEN has announced the latest batch of PEN Translates winners -- 16 titles originally written in 10 languages, including Greenlandic (Zombieland by Sørine Steenholdt -- see the milk publicity page -- in Charlotte Barslund's translation, forthcoming from Norvik Press) and two titles in Vietnamese.
       I look forward to seeing these .....

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       Peter Blackstock Q & A

       Via I'm pointed to Tim Groenland's Q & A with the Grove Atlantic-editor in “A list that reflects the world”: An Interview with Peter Blackstock at Post45.
       It's part of their Issue 9: Editing American Literature, which includes some other interesting pieces, too.

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       China Miéville/Keanu Reeves profile

       China Miéville and Keanu Reeves have collaborated on a novel, The Book of Elsewhere, apparently based on a popular comic book series -- see the official site, or pre-order your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk -- and at The Guardian Sam Leith profiles them, in ‘I wanted to do pulpy, hyper-violent action’: Keanu Reeves on his novel with China Miéville and the afterlife of The Matrix.

       Several books by Miéville are under review at the complete review -- e.g. Perdido Street Station -- but, while I do have and expect to get to the two volumes of Dial H, I don't think I'll be getting to this one. (Nothing by Reeves is under review at the site.)

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       Georg-Büchner-Preis

       They've announced the winner of this year's Georg Büchner Prize, the leading German language author prize, and it is Oswald Egger; he will get to pick up his prize on 2 November.
       Not much of his work is available in English, but Green Integer did publish Room of Rumor: Tunings; see their publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.
       See also the Suhrkamp author page, with information about some of his other titles.

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       Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year

       They've announced the winner of this year's Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, with In The Blink of an Eye by Jo Callaghan taking the main prize.

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       July Asymptote

       The July issue of Asymptote is now available -- a ton of good material for your weekend reading.
       Not least: Sarah Gear has An interview with Georgi Gospodinov -- the author of Time Shelter (etc.).

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       PEN/Heim Translation Fund

       PEN America administers the PEN/Heim Translation Fund -- and, as Dan Sheehan now reports at the Literary Hub, 100+ translators call for PEN America to relinquish control of the Heim Fund.
       The translators' open letter to the PEN America Board of Trustees is printed there, along with the response from PEN America.

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       Hong Kong Book Fair

       The Hong Kong Book Fair runs through the 23rd, and while Atlas Shao reports that Hong Kong Book Fair spotlights Beijing's literary treasures in China Daily, Hans Tse reports that Shortage of writers hurting local literary scene, publishers say as Hong Kong Book Fair opens.
       Ah, those darned writer-shortages.

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       Akutagawa and Naoki Prizes

       They've announced the latest set of winners of the Akutagawa and Naoki Prizes, the leading Japanese fiction prizes; see, for example, Thu-Huong Ha's report in The Japan Times, Three novelists named for Akutagawa and Naoki awards.
       The Akutagawa Prize was shared by バリ山行 ('Extreme mountain climbing') by Matsunaga K. Sanzo -- see the Kodansha publicity page -- and サンショウウオの四十九日 ('The 49th day of the salamander') by Asahina Aki; see the Shinchosha publicity page.
       The Naoki Prize went to ツミデミック, by Ichiho Michi; see the Kobunsha publicity page.

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       Forward Prizes shortlists

       They've announced the shortlists for this year's Forward Prizes -- "the most influential awards for new poetry in the UK and Ireland" -- in its four categories.

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       Last Nights of Paris review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Philippe Soupault's 1928 novel, Last Nights of Paris -- notable, at least in its English version, also because it was translated by poet William Carlos Williams.

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       Jan Michalski Prize shortlist

       They've announced the shortlist -- well, the 'second selection' -- for this year's Jan Michalski Prize for Literature, awarded to a work of world literature, in any genre and any language.
       The only one of the five titles under review at the complete review is Traces of Enayat by Iman Mersal.
       The winner will be announced on 27 November.

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       Singapore Literature Prize shortlists

       They've announced the shortlists for this year's Singapore Literature Prize -- 71 works in 16 categories in four languages -- English, Chinese, Tamil, and Malay, selected from 247 submissions.
       At the official site you can click through the different categories and languages; somewhat more convenient is the press release (warning ! dreaded pdf format !) -- but, given the number of shortlisted titles, it's a long press release -- 85 pages.
       The winners will be announced 10 September.

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       New Virago Modern Classics design

       Virago has announced a new design for its Modern Classics list.
       I liked the old, original design -- but in any case, it's the books that count.

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       Tonke Dragt (1930-2024)

       Dutch author asnd illustrator Tonke Dragt (1930-2024) has passed away; see, for example, the DutchNews report.
       Pushkin Press has published several of her works.

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       Worlds Built to Fall Apart review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of David Lapoujade on Versions of Philip K. Dick, Worlds Built to Fall Apart.

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       Benjamín Labatut profile

       In The Guardian Sam Leith has a profile of the We Cease to Understand the World1-author, in ‘People say my book gave them a panic attack’: When We Cease to Understand the World author Benjamín Labatut.

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       Prix de la littérature arabe finalists

       They've announced the finalists for this year's prix de la littérature arabe; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       The winner will be announced 27 November.

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       Top ... 75 Sci-Fi books

       Two year's ago I mentioned Esquire's list of '50 Best Sci-Fi Books of All Time'.
       Well, they've now expanded it, offering: The 75 Best Sci-Fi Books of All Time.
       As I already complained regarding the 50-title list, they continue to limit it to one book per author, undermining their 'best' claim. (If you're putting together a best book list, it doesn't/can't matter who wrote them .....)

       Look for their top-100 list, presumably coming in the fall of 2026.

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       New RSL fellows

       The Royal Society of Literature has announced 29 new Fellows and 13 new Honorary Fellows.

       Works by only two of the new Fellows are under review at the complete review -- Mick Herron (e.g. The Secret Hours) and Nii Ayikwei Parkes (Tail of the Blue Bird).

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       Bestselling in ... the UK

       At The Bookseller Tom Tivnan reports on the bestselling books and authors in the UK for the first half of the year, according to Nielsen BookScan; see also the top 20 -- both by units sold and value.
       Julia Donaldson tops the list, with 1,253,890 units sold; J.K.Rowling is third, with 383,261; Stephen King slips in at number 19, with 159,186.

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       Dennis Cooper Q & A

       At Interview Lucy K. Shaw has a Q & A with Dennis Cooper Has a New Book Out. Just Don't Expect Him to Do Any Readings.
       Among his responses:

I read a lot of fiction, but I only read avant-garde fiction or whatever, I never read normal fiction.

       (And see also DC's, 'The blog of author Dennis Cooper'.

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       Union State literature awards

       BelTA reports that Lukashenko presents Union State literature, art awards at Slavianski Bazaar in Vitebsk, as Putin-puppet Aleksandr Lukashenko presented: "prizes of the Union State of Belarus and Russia for literature and art for 2023-2024 to people, who had made a significant contribution to the reinforcement of friendship between the peoples of Belarus and Russia".
       Yeah, there's an 'honor' .....
       And I don't suspect we'll see the work of any of these prize-winners in English (or other) translation soon.

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       Lit Hub's Most Anticipated (II)

       At the Literary Hub they have Lit Hub's Most Anticipated Books of 2024, Part Two -- '193 Books to Read in the Second Half of the Year'.
       Certainly some titles of interest here .....
       The only titles under review at the complete review at this time are Lev Grossman's The Bright Sword and Ogawa Yoko's Mina's Matchbox.

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       International Booker Prize judging panel

       They've announced the members of the judging panel for next year's International Booker Prize, and they are: Max Porter, who will chair; Caleb Femi, Sana Goyal, Anton Hur, and Beth Orton.
       They've also announced the dates for it, with the longlist to be announced 25 February 2025, the shortlist on 8 April, and the winner on 20 May.

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       Robert Chandler on Andrey Platonov

       In Prospect Robert Chandler writes on People person: the greatness of Andrey Platonov -- a good introduction to the author.
       His (and wife Elizabeth's) new translation of Chevengur is recently out in the US from New York Review Books -- see their publicity page -- and from Harvill Secker in the UK -- see their publicity page.
       The US publishers recently noted: "Platonov's Chevengur has been a bit of a breakout "hit"", which is pretty neat.
       The only Platono under review at the complete review is Happy Moscow.

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

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       Hotlist finalists

       They've announced the thirty finalists for the German Hotlist competition, selected from 204 entries -- one from each independent publisher.
       Readers can vote, with the three top vote-getters joining seven titles chosen by the official jury for the shortlist that will be announced on 10 September; the winner will be announced 18 October.

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

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