opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

1 - 10 June 2025

1 June: Raymond Queneau | New Story of the Stone review
2 June: AI and writing | Losing the rhyme | Daniel Kehlmann profile
3 June: Tom Comitta profile | Maison des écrivains
4 June: EstLit | Lars Iyer Q & A | A Fictional Inquiry review
5 June: Edmund White (1940-2025) | Salman Rushdie profile
6 June: Griffin Poetry Prize | Translation Prize winners | Theakston Old Peculier shortlists | Exophony review
7 June: Премия «Дар» | Geoff Dyer Q & A
8 June: Spanish literature of NYC | Сафран Q & A
9 June: George Szirtes Q & A | The Book review
10 June: Publishing in ... Israel (2024) | Frederick Forsyth (1938-2025)

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       Publishing in ... Israel (2024)

       The National Library of Israel has issued its 2024 Book Report -- the publishing-numbers for 2024.
        6,928 books were published in Israel in 2024 -- 548 of which dealt with the 7 October 2023 attacks (which seems like ... a significant percentage). 27 per cent of books published were works of fiction -- barely more than the 23 per cent that were 'Jewish studies', with children/YA books the third-largest category, with 17 per cent.
       90 per cent of books were in Hebrew -- and a mere 2 per cent were in Arabic (fewer than the 5 per cent in English ...).
       21 percent of books were works in translation -- a staggering 68 per cent from the English, followed by French (5 per cent) and German (3 per cent). About half of the works of prose fiction published were works in translation.

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

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       Frederick Forsyth (1938-2025)

       Author Frederick Forsyth -- best-known for The Day Of The Jackal -- has passed away; see, for example, the obituaries in The Guardian and at the BBC.

       I've only read The Day Of The Jackal -- many decades ago, but I was very impressed by it; see also the publicity pages from G.P. Putnam's Sons and Arrow, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.

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

       George Szirtes Q & A

       At hlo there's a lengthy Q & A with George Szirtes: I saw myself as a Budapest tenement block in an English suburb. Lots of photographs as well.

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

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       The Book review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Stéphane Mallarmé's The Book -- the Sylvia Gorelick translation, published by Exact Change (whose books are, of course, always worth checking out).

       Those who find the 'text' too challenging might turn to Klaus Scherübel's take, at least for the bookshelf: as the Printed Matter page explains: "Note: This is a block of styrofoam with a dust jacket".
       Another fun-sounding variation is that conceived by Holly Cundiff, The Glorious Lie / The Glory of the Lie -- "A Card Game Inspired by Stéphane Mallarmé’s The Book". Appropriately enough: "The manner of playing the game is left open".
       (The book also features in Peter Cornell's The Ways of Paradise, which is what led me to cover it.)

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

       Spanish literature of NYC

       At El País Andrea Aguilar reports on The Spanish literature of New York City, as this year's Madrid Book Fair has a focus on Nueva York en español: la luz del otro lado del Atlántico.

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

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       Сафран Q & A

       At Global Voices Filip Noubel has a Q & A with Сафран-founder Svitlana Pryzynchuk, discussing how A niche publisher is using Asian literature to bring Taiwan and Japan closer to Ukraine.

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

       Премия «Дар»

       In The Kyiv Independent Kate Tsurkan writes on how Controversial Russian literature prize sparks debate on separating culture from war crimes -- the Dar Literary Prize, which: "supports new voices and the finest examples of independent contemporary Russian-language literature", founded by Maidenhair-author Mikhail Shishkin.
       Lots of impressive names associated with the prize -- including Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich, Tomas Venclova, and Lyudmila Ulitskaya -- and yet .....

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       Geoff Dyer Q & A

       At The Guardian this week's 'The books of my life'-column features Geoff Dyer: ‘I don’t go to books for comfort; I have a memory foam pillow for that’.
       Among his responses:

The book I came back to

I’ve reread The Names by Don DeLillo more than any other book. It remains a high point, not just in DeLillo’s career but in the history of the postwar novel.

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

       Griffin Poetry Prize

       They've announced the winner of this year's international Griffin Poetry Prize, and it is Psyche Running, Karen Leeder's translation of Durs Grünbein's texts, with the prize (of C$130,000) shared, with 60% going to the translator and 40% to the original author.
       See also the Seagull publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, or Amazon.co.uk.

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

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       Translation Prize winners

       The winners of the French-American Foundation Translation Prizes have been announced, and at the French-American Foundation they have Interviews with the 2025 Translation Prize Finalists & Winners.
       The winner in the fiction category was Lazer Lederhendler's translation of Christophe Bernard's The Hollow Beast, see also the Biblioasis publicity page.

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

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       Theakston Old Peculier shortlists

       They've announced the shortlists for this year's Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and McDermid Debut Award.
       The winners will be announced 17 July.

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

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       Exophony review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Tawada Yoko's Voyages Outside the Mother Tongue, in Exophony, just out in English in the US, from New Directions (and coming soon in the UK, from Dialogue).

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

       Edmund White (1940-2025)

       American author Edmund White has passed away; see, for example, the obituaries in The Guardian and The New York Times (presumably paywalled); see also the Lyceum Agency author page.

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

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       Salman Rushdie profile

       In The Observer Erica Wagner profiles the author, in Free speech, fiction and survival: my conversation with Salman Rushdie.

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

       EstLit

       The Estonian Literature Centre has launched a new 'English-language magazine dedicated to showcasing Estonian literature', EstLit -- whereby: "The online edition is updated continuously throughout the year, while the print issue is published annually in the autumn".
       Looks like a promising start.

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

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       Lars Iyer Q & A

       Via, I'm pointed to David Southard's 13 Questions for Lars Iyer -- the Wittgenstein Jr-author -- at Books of Some Substance

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

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       A Fictional Inquiry review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Daniele Del Giudice's 1983 novel, A Fictional Inquiry, forthcoming -- though only in the fall -- in English, from New Vessel Press.

       The inquiry in question is, in no small part, into the (non-)writing life of Notes Without a Text-author Roberto Bazlen. (Though note also that a literal translation of the original Italian title of the novel would be ... 'Wimbledon Stadium'.)

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

       Tom Comitta profile

       Tom Comitta's two-in-one of "The Most Wanted and Unwanted Novels", People's Choice Literature, is out today, and in The New York Times Elisabeth Egan profiles these Novels Inspired by Opinion Polls ? They’re Here, and They’re Weird (presumably paywalled) .
       Egan reports that:

The book was rejected by 50 publishers. One was interested in “The Most Wanted Novel” but balked at the package deal.

“I wrote to art galleries: Can we call this an art project and publish this as an art book?” Comitta said. “Nothing was working. Nobody would do it.”

       Eventually, Columbia University Press editor Philip Leventhal bought the book -- I wasn't aware of that at the time I reviewed the book, but he's also the one who commissioned my The Complete Review Guide to Contemporary World Fiction -- see the Columbia University Press publicity page --, so he obviously has an excellent and discerning eye .....

       (Updated - 4 June): See now also 12 or 20 (second series) questions with Tom Comitta at rob mclennan's blog.

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

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       Maison des écrivains

       The French Maison des écrivains et de la littérature has apparently closed its doors, having run out of money; see, for example, the ActuaLitté report, Asphyxiée, la Maison des écrivains et de la littérature ferme ses portes.
       See also Michael Washburn, wondering two months ago Can Anyone Save the Mél ?

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

       AI and writing

       In The Observer Vanessa Thorpe reports that The literary battle against AI is on: ‘Real words from real people are so much better’.
       She starts out describing a book conceived by -- but not actually ever written -- by generative AI, i.e. just the 'idea' of the novel. Similarly focusing on the generation of 'ideas', Nick Harkaway is later quoted as saying:

People keep saying it would be great for new ideas, but I have ideas coming out of my head. That is not the problem. The problem is execution, and it is not good at that. I am sure it would be good in biotechnology, but why are we using it for writing text? And it is also terrible for the planet, so we can’t use it at scale anyway.

       This hasn't been my (limited) experience: I don't know about coming up with 'ideas', but I've been very impressed by generative AI's generative execution -- what's generally considered 'creative writing'. (As far as dealing with factual information, generative AI seems far too ... generative to me, making up stuff (those infamous hallucinations -- not least the made up references (and books)); only when more or less limited to a text it's specifically been fed and asked to comment on or do something else with is it in any way reliable.) But as far as pure invention goes, and imitating specific styles, it does ... worryingly well. As also suggested by at least one person quoted in this article:

Ruth, her friend, admitted she had recently tried it to create a story for her grandson. “I used ChatGPT to turn it into a story in the style of Julia Donaldson and it was brilliant. I found it quite scary.”

       I don't know how, for example, parents can resist using generative AI to create bespoke -- even personalized -- stories for their kids.
       Indeed, surely written-to-order fiction is one of the great potentials of generative AI -- choose your own adventure indeed. What is most amazing/troubling about ChatGPT and the like is the ease with which it produces this stuff: if you don't like one version you can prompt it to make the changes you'd like and it does so practically instantly. And could do so endlessly.
       (Yes, there are (huge) costs to this -- but they're generally not borne by the user; much like private-automobile use, the personal benefit and lack of cost to the user outweigh all considerations of the incredible environmental damage the thing does.)
       I do find arguments/statements such as: "I would not like to discover that any emotional experience I was having while connecting with an author’s thoughts was not real" ... curious. Connecting with an author's thoughts ? 'Real' ?
       Another writer says: "I would never use AI prompts for any creative enterprise. It is completely counter to what we do as artists and it dehumanises creativity" .....
       As someone who is very text-focused -- i.e. not concerned with who the 'author' of a work is -- the arguments about the artificiality, as it were, of a work don't carry that much weight for me; I don't really get them. Quality is more of an issue -- but for much creative writing, like basic story-telling, generative AI really is good enough, just as for much translation generative AI or Google Translate is good enough (not 'literary' translation, but, really, for your basic pop thriller (or to read a news story in a foreign newspaper) it will usually do -- and if the AI has been trained specifically on similar books it can be pretty decent).
       Big issues remain -- notably that of copyright (not so much of the output but of the illegal use of copyrighted material as input) -- but the mass-use of generative AI to produce 'creative writing' -- fiction, poetry, drama -- seems absolutely inevitable to me, and the focus should be on the potential, and the consequences, of that.

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

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       Losing the rhyme

       The Economist finds that Rhyme, once in its prime, is in decline (paywalled).
       Remarkably:

In 1900, 80% of poems contained rhyme; today, only around 25% do. Numbers of rhymes fell too: at the start of the 20th century over 60% of lines rhymed; now under 5% do

       Presumably the sales of rhyming-dictionaries have fallen too .....
       They have quite a bit more to say about what poetry has become in modern times-- including finding that:

Look at a list of recent winners of any of the big poetry prizes and most will share three characteristics: you will not have heard of them; their poems will not rhyme; and they will have worked as poets in universities, peddling poetry as (partially) state-subsidised muses. This is poetry less as a paid-for product than as a literary utility: something that—like road surfacing or sewage disposal—is widely considered necessary for a civilised society but that no one wants to fork out for.

       Ouch.
       But in these times, maybe there will be resurgence of rhyming poetry ? Not human-texted but .....
       Generative AI is amazingly good at writing with certain constraints; presumably fed by great heaps of rhyming English poetry it can do a more than passable imitation of it. Feeding this The Economist article to ChatGPT I prompted it to write a sonnet in response; in a matter of seconds it spit out:

Certainly! Here's a rhyming Shakespearean sonnet in response to the essay above—a defense, lament, and quiet celebration of rhyme in the face of modern poetic trends:

Upon the Waning of the Rhyme

When rhyme was king, the common tongue would sing,
Its couplets danced in hearts and village square.
Now poems brood on death, on waste, on wing,
In lowercase, italics, and despair.

The bards of yore sold thousands in a day,
While modern verse is lectured, not recited.
We learned to strip the lark of all its play,
To show we’re grave, obscure, and uninvited.

Yet still the child delights in echo's chime,
And still the ear detects the rhyming thread;
Though scorned by prize, and deemed an antique crime,
It lingers, like a ghost not truly dead.

Let critics scoff, and let the trend depart—
The rhyme remains, tucked deep inside the heart.

       That doesn't seem half-bad to me. More terrifying is that ChatGPT also then said: "Let me know if you'd like a more humorous, satirical, or formal variation—I’d be glad to tailor it" -- as it could, of course, spit out endless new variations, essentially instantly. Hard for human poets -- university-affiliated or not -- to compete with that.

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

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       Daniel Kehlmann profile

       In In America, a German-Austrian novelist hears echoes of his father’s life under Nazism at Forward PJ Grisar profiles Daniel Kehlmann -- mainly about his G.W.Pabst-novel, The Director, now out in English.

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

       Raymond Queneau

       At Mining the Dalkey Archive -- which you hopefully check out regularly -- Chad W. Post writes about: 'A literary treasure and seven categories introducing the works of an Oulipian master', in Where to Start with Raymond Queneau -- an extensive overview.

       Several works by Queneau are under review at the complete review:

• Children of Clay
• Exercises in Style
• The Flight of Icarus
• The Last Days
• We Always Treat Women Too Well
• Zazie in the Metro

       You can guess which are my favorites .....

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

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       New Story of the Stone review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of An Early Chinese Science Fiction Novel by Wu Jianren, New Story of the Stone, coming out from Columbia University Press.

       Yes, this is a sequel (of sorts) to Cao Xueqin's eighteenth-century classic, The Story of the Stone, one of the greatest of all novels. New Story of the Stone isn't anywhere in the same league -- little is -- but it is very good to see this in English, and it is also of interest as a novel of modern China, then (around 1900) and now.

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

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