opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

11 - 20 February 2021

11 February: PEN America Literary Awards finalists | PEN Translates awards | Folio Prize shortlist | An I-Novel review
12 February: Society of Authors' Translation Prizes | Prix Sade longlist
13 February: 'Crime Fiction' changing of the guard at NYTBR | Fragments of an Infinite Memory review
14 February: Sergei Lebedev profile -- and top 100 Russian books of the 21st century ?
15 February: Mourid Barghouti (1944-2021) | Iran Book of the Year Awards finalists | How to Order the Universe review
16 February: Swedish Academy Nordic Prize | Goncourt sales success | Urs Jaeggi (1931-2021)
17 February: The future of Japanese literature ? | '100 books from Eastern Europe and Central Asia'
18 February: US bookstore sales 2020 | Fondazione Gesualdo Bufalino | GRM review
19 February: Sadean tax break in France | Kerala Sahitya Akademi Awards | Dissipatio H.G. review
20 February: Jaipur Literature Festival | Premio Primavera de novela | Publishing Scotland Translation Fund

go to weblog

return to main archive

       Jaipur Literature Festival

       The Jaipur Literature Festival has started; it runs through tomorrow, and then continues 26 - 28 February -- all virtually. Lots of good stuff, as always.

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

---

       Premio Primavera de novela

       They've announced the winner of this year's Premio Primavera de novela, another high-pay-out Spanish literary prize -- €100,000, for an unpublished novel -- and it is Los ingratos, by Pedro Simón; see, for example, the report at El mundo.
       Until 2011 this prize, inaugurated in 1997, paid out €200,000, but apparently they couldn't sustain that. Still, €100,000 is nothing to sneeze at either.

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

---

       Publishing Scotland Translation Fund

       Publishing Scotland helps subsidize translations of works by Scottish authors into foreign languages, and they've just announced the latest batch of grants, awarded to fifteen publishers from ten countries.
       As they note, unsurprisingly: "Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart was a popular choice with applicants".
       Grants supporting translation are always helpful -- even for works written in the most-translated-from language, English -- so it's good to see Publishing Scotland dedicating some funds to this.

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

       Sadean tax break in France

       The French government has issued an official call for corporate help in order to purchase the manuscript of the Marquis de Sade's The 120 Days of Sodom (plus étui), dangling generous tax breaks as an incentive.
       The Ministry of Culture declared the manuscript a 'national treasure' in 2017, meaning also it could not be sold abroad, but now they're apparently hoping to purchase it themselves; the value is currently pegged at an impressive €4,550,000. I do wonder what companies will want to explain to their shareholders that they contributed to the purchase of this -- having the company's name associated with that in perpetuity; it is, after all, a very controversial (and problematic) text. But, yes, attitudes towards culture are different in France (at least than in the US) -- and there's no denying this object's cultural-historical significance.
       Beyond any literary considerations, the manuscript -- a roll, rather than the usual pile of papers -- is pretty neat itself; see some images at this Marquis de Sade site.

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

---

       Kerala Sahitya Akademi Awards

       They've announced the winners of this year's Kerala Sahitya Akademi Awards, and S. Hareesh's Malayalam novel Moustache -- which had preciously won the JCB Prize for Literature -- won the best novel prize.
       In almost (entirely ?) predictable knee-jerk reaction BJP state chief K. Surendran complained:

Kerala has not seen such a derogatory novel. The decision to award Meesha should be seen as an act against the Hindu community.

       Is there anything these guys -- and they do appear always to be guys -- don't see as insulting Hinduism ?
       (The right-wing BJP party is the nationally ruling party in India, but not exactly a force in Kerala: of the 140 seats in that state's legislative assembly they currently hold exactly ... one.)
       See the PTI report, here at The Wire, ‘Meesha’ Wins Best Novel at Kerala Sahitya Akademi Awards; BJP Says Move 'Anti-Hindu'.

       Moustache does not appear to have a US or UK publisher yet -- though hopefully it will; meanwhile, see the Harper Collins India publicity page; it is available at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

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

---

       Dissipatio H.G. review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Guido Morselli's last-man-on-earth novel, Dissipatio H.G.: The Vanishing, recently out in English from New York Review Books.

       (I wonder if they worried the title might be too ... intimidating for US readers, and that's why they added the subtitle; it doesn't appear in the original Italian edition.)

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

       US bookstore sales 2020

       As Jim Milliot reports in Publishers Weekly, Bookstore Sales Fell 28.3% in 2020 in the US, with sales down to US$6.34 billion compared to US$8.84 billion in 2019.
       While the numbers were improving towards the end of the year -- December sales were *only* down 15.2% -- the year-total numbers are pretty dismal, if not unexpected.

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

---

       Fondazione Gesualdo Bufalino

       Italian author Gesualdo Bufalino celebrated his centenary last year -- he lived 1920 to 1996 -- and in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Andreas Rossman writes about him and his hometown, Cosimo, in Das Palastgefängnis eines Poeten -- mentioning also the Fondazione Gesualdo Bufalino, which holds all things Bufalino, including his extensive archives.
       Impressively, they also have Bufalino's entire -- huge -- private library, always a fascinating thing to see, noting:

The consistency of Gesualdo Bufalino's personal library is about 10.000 volumes.

       And, yes, they also have his videotape collection -- "The video library has about 350 VHS videocassettes, mostly recorded by Bufalino himself". Not too many writer's archives you'll find with VHS-tape collections of this size, I imagine .....

       Only two Bufalino titles are under review at the complete review -- Tommaso and the Blind Photographer and Qui pro quo. (I read most of the others before I started the site.)

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

---

       GRM review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Sibylle Berg's Swiss Book Prize-winning 2019 novel, GRM.

       The Kiepenheuer & Witsch foreign rights page says the US/World English rights are: "under negotiation". I imagine this will come out in English -- and am very curious how it will play in the UK, where it is set. As to whether US/UK publishers will also use subtitle, Brainfuck .....

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

       The future of Japanese literature ?

       In Metropolis Eric Margolis wonders: 'With Japanese literature in translation finally breaching feminist frontiers, what's next ?' in 2021: What is the Future of Japanese Literature ?
       The focus is very much on fiction in (mainly English) translation, which is of course only a slice of present-day Japanese literature, but it's always interesting to see what catches on and works abroad.

       Quite a few of the authors and books mentioned are under review at the complete review.

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

---

       '100 books from Eastern Europe and Central Asia'

       The Calvert Journal recommends no less than 100 books to read from Eastern Europe and Central Asia -- lots of good books that are indeed worth your attention.

       Many of these are also under review at the complete review; see the (overlapping) indices of Eastern European literature and literature from Russia and the former Soviet Union under review.

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

       Swedish Academy Nordic Prize

       The Swedish Academy has announced the winner of this year's Nordic Prize, a SK400,000 (almost US$50,000) author prize for a Scandinavian author, and it is poet Eldrid Lunden.
       There doesn't appear to be any collection of her poems available in English yet, but you can find a short biography and some samples at Poetry International.
       Among the poems there:

Lacan's emptiness has not

turned up

       Not bad.
       The Nordic Prize has a good track record; recent winners include Dag Solstad (2017) and Karl Ove Knausgård (2019).

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

---

       Goncourt sales success

       Winning the prix Goncourt always provides a big sales boost -- and last year's prize certainly seems to have helped the sales of Hervé Le Tellier's L'Anomalie, pushing it to sales some twenty times what his books usually do. The top-selling Goncourt-winner of all times remains the 1984 winner, Marguerite Duras' The Lover, and with 1,630,000 copies shifted no one is going to catch up to that anytime soon, but, as reported at Livres Hebdo, L'Anomalie is now number two on the all-time list, having moved past ... the 2006 winner, Jonathan Littell's The Kindly Ones.

       Several Le Tellier titles are under review at the complete review -- see, e.g. All Happy Families. This one is forthcoming in English from Other Press, and I'm looking forward to seeing it.

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

---

       Urs Jaeggi (1931-2021)

       Swiss sociologist and author Urs Jaeggi has passed away; see, for example, the swissinfo.ch report.
       He wrote several works of fiction, though none appear to have been translated into English; he also won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 1981.

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

       Mourid Barghouti (1944-2021)

       Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti has passed away; see the BBC report or, for example, the Maya Jaggi profile in The Guardian from 2008, A life in writing: Mourid Barghouti.
       He is probably best-known for his memoir, I Saw Ramallah; see the publicity pages from Anchor and Bloomsbury, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

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

---

       Iran Book of the Year Awards finalists

       As the Tehran Times reports, Iran's Book of the Year Awards announces nominees in literature category -- "the subsections of Literary Criticism, Classical Literature, Non-Persian Literature and Arabic Literature".
       Always interesting to see what gets translated -- and the Non-Persian Literature section finalists include translations of Andrei Bely's Petersburg, Olga Tokarczuk's Flights, and Richard Powers' The Overstory.

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

---

       How to Order the Universe review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of María José Ferrada's How to Order the Universe, just out from Tin House.

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

       Sergei Lebedev profile -- and top 100 Russian books of the 21st century ?

       Sergei Lebedev's Untraceable is just out, and in The Guardian Luke Harding profiles him, in 'In Russia, the new evil is rooted in the old evil': novelist Sergei Lebedev on Putin, poison and state terror

       Among the interesting bits: "he mentions a list of the 100 best Russian books of the 21st century, compiled by the Moscow literary journal Polka", which sounds intriguing -- as indeed it is: check out the 100 главных русских книг XXI века.
       Quite a few of these have been translated into English -- indeed quite a few are under review at the complete review -- including the number two title, Eugene Vodolazkin's Laurus.
       The top title ? The conveniently just-translated In Memory of Memory, by Maria Stepanova; see the publicity pages from New Directions and Fitzcarraldo Editions, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.
       (I have an e-copy of this, but probably will wait to get a print copy before having a go at it.)

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

       'Crime Fiction' changing of the guard at NYTBR

       After an incredible run, longtime (since 1988 !) 'Crime Fiction'-columnist at The New York Times Book Review Marilyn Stasio is stepping down and, as The New York Times has announced, Sarah Weinman Becomes New Columnist for Crime Fiction as Marilyn Stasio Retires.
       No question that Weinman is incredibly well-qualified to succeed Stasio -- few people devour as much crime fiction as she does, or are as knowledgeable about the subject; given her background, from her early days as a 'lit blogger' -- she started her Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind (whose earliest incarnation I'm pleased to see is still online) in that early golden age of lit-blogging, not long after I started this Literary Saloon -- to her success as editor of crime anthologies (e.g. Women Crime Writers: Eight Suspense Novels of the 1940s & 50s (Library of America) and author of The Real Lolita, she is indeed, as the announcement has it, the: "obvious suspect" for the position.

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

---

       Fragments of an Infinite Memory review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Maël Renouard's Fragments of an Infinite Memory: My Life with the Internet, just out from New York Review Books.

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

       Society of Authors' Translation Prizes

       They've announced the winners of this year's (British) Society of Authors' Translation Prizes -- prizes for translations from five different languages this year (it varies from year to year, as some of the other prizes are bi- or triennial), as well as the TA First Translation prize.
       The only winning title under review at the complete review is the winner of the John Florio Prize, for translation from Italian -- Jhumpa Lahiri's translation of Domenico Starnone's Trick.

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

---

       Prix Sade longlist

       They've announced the twelve-title strong longlist for this year's prix Sade; see, for example, the Livres Hebdo report.
       It includes the obligatory de Sade-related titles -- Alberto Brodesco's Sade et le cinéma and the Dictionnaire Sade (which is something I definitely want to see; see also the L'Harmattan publicity page) -- and quite a variety of other titles, including Garth Greenwell's Cleanness. Hard not to root for Murder Most Serene-author Gabrielle Wittkop's Hemlock, however; see also the Quidam publicity page.
       The shortlist will be announced on 24 June, and the winner on 2 October.

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

       PEN America Literary Awards finalists

       They've announced the finalists in the eleven different categories for this year's PEN America Literary Awards.
       The only title under review at the complete review is one of the PEN Translation Prize finalists, Chris Andrews' translation of Kaouther Adimi's Our Riches (published as: A Bookshop in Algiers in the UK).
       The winners will be announced 8 April.

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

---

       PEN Translates awards

       English PEN has announced their PEN Translates awards -- grants for the translations of 15 books, covering 14 countries and 12 languages.
       Only one previous book by any of these authors is under review at the complete review -- Daniela Hodrová's A Kingdom of Souls -- and I'm definitely curious about this new work of hers, but quite a few of the others look to be of considerable interest as well.

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

---

       Folio Prize shortlist

       They've announced the eight-title shortlist for this year's Rathbones Folio Prize, awarded to: "works of literature in which the subjects being explored achieve their most perfect and thrilling expression", regardless of genre.
       It looks like an interesting variety, though I haven't seen any of these.
       The winner will be announced 24 March.

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

---

       An I-Novel review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Mizumura Minae's 1995 An I-Novel, now in English from Columbia University Press -- certainly one of the most anticipated translations of the year for me.

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

previous entries (1 - 10 February 2021)

archive index

- search the site -

- return to top of the page -

© 2021 the complete review


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