Place: Hong Kong

Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

The latest literary news from Hong Kong, Mexico, and North Macedonia!

This week, our Editors-at-Large explore blockchain publishing, poets’ novels, and literary surrealism. Read on to find out more!

Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

In December, Hong Kong independent bookstore Mount Zero Books announced that it will be closing in March 2024 due to anonymous complaints on the bookstore’s “illegal occupation of government land”, and the resulting warning from the Lands Department regarding the tiled platform outside of the bookstore. Mount Zero Books’ experience is not an isolated issue; it is part of the narrowing of Hong Kong’s cultural space under the current political climate, in which independent publishers and bookstores are facing increasing control and censorship. In 2022, for instance, local independent publisher Hillway Press was not allowed to participate in the annual Book Fair organised by Hong Kong Trade Development Council. The publishing house then planned to host a “Hongkongers’ Book Fair” featuring 14 independent local publishers and bookstores in the shopping mall Mall Plus in Causeway Bay. Unfortunately, the book fair was forced to cancel as they were accused of violating the terms of venue use. In December 2023, one of the founders of Hillway Press emigrated and the company decided to close down. What is more, two of Hong Kong’s remaining independent bookstores, Have A Nice Stay and Hunter Bookstore, have said that they face frequent complaints and regular monitoring by government departments.

In light of increasing challenges — both economic and political — faced by the local publishing industry, Hong Kong writers are beginning to explore new means of publishing their works and reaching out to readers. Hong Kong writer Dung Kai-cheung has been counting down to the 15 February publication of his new work, Autofiction, on his own writing platform, Dungfookei. Autofiction will be published in the form of an NFT. The new autobiographical nonfiction is part of the writer’s exploration of the potential of Web3’s blockchain technology for decentralizing publishing and granting more autonomy in user control and ownership of data. In 2023, Dung joined Likecoin — an application-specific blockchain for decentralized publishing developed by Hong Kong entrepreneur Ko Chung-kin — to republish his famous novel Tiangong Kaiwu·Lifelike, which became the first Chinese novel to be published as an NFT. While Tiangong Kaiwu·Lifelike is available for purchase on Likecoin’s website, Dung also developed his own platforms Dungfookei and DKC in Translation to digitalise his works and interact with readers in new ways. Although the project is still experimental, by turning to the web for more freedom and opportunities, Dung’s foray into Web3 and NFT publishing represents an innovative frontier in the evolving landscape of literature and author-reader interaction. READ MORE…

Winter 2024: Highlights from the Team

Get excited to dip into our Winter 2024 issue with these highlights from our team!

Ilya Kaminsky’s “Reading Dante in Ukraine” makes an impassioned case for the crucial role of art amid the horrors of war. What we need, as Dante’s journey shows us, is to defend ourselves with it: a tune to walk to, even in the underworld, as long as one still walks. In Miklós Vámos’s “Electric Train,”  translated by Ági Bori‚ the question-answer format gives the piece levity and rhythm, and the counterpoint of the humor interplaying with the troubled relationships brings it powerful depth. I found wisdom in the wry humor of Jaime Barrios Carrillo’s poems in David Unger’s translation. I love the image of angels spending the evening in their hotel rooms, ironing their enormous white wings.

—Ellen Elias-Bursac, Contributing Editor

The masterful language in Ági Bori’s translation, as though hand-holding the reader through a children’s story, and the simple act of gifting a present in the story belie the depth and complexity of emotional turmoil that wash over Miklós Vámos’s characters in “Electric Train,” a turmoil that seemingly hits out of nowhere like a wave yet in fact stems from a deep brewing well of built up memories and tensions. The contrast highlights all the more the challenges, and perhaps even limits, of recognizing and understanding another’s intentions, experiences, and feelings.

Rage, sorrow, resilience, helplessness, hope, a hunger for life and love and connection, grief, a numbing screaming despair: it is difficult to put into words the sensations that ran through me as I read Samer Abu Hawwash’s “My People” in Huda J. Fakhreddine’s translation. It cannot possibly compare to the feelings and thoughts of Samer Abu Hawwash and the Palestinian people, to the reality of having each day and moment narrow down to dried bread and tear tracks.

I was intrigued by Laura Garmeson’s discussion, in her review of Brazilian author Itamar Vieira Junior’s Crooked Plow, of the tongue as “both creator and destroyer. It has the power to make and unmake worlds.” It is a through line in Crooked Plow that reminds us of the power and possibilities of language and story to shape our lives. Garmeson’s review, in a way, is also a fire that kindles awareness of Itamar Vieira Junior’s work and the legacies, realities, and possible futures for Afro-Brazilian communities. The tongue as symbol also feels like a through line between these pieces in their rumination on what is gained and lost and pushed aside in the choices we make of what, how, and when we say (or write) things, or not.

—Julie Shi, Senior Executive Assistant

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

The latest literary news from Hong Kong, India, and Kenya!

This week, our Editors-at-Large report on documentaries about poetry, award-winning short stories, and exciting translation fellowships. From novels shortlisted for big prizes to upcoming movie screenings, read on to find out more!

Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

Taiwan’s 60th annual Golden Horse Awards will be held on November 25 and Hong Kong film director Ann Hui’s most recent documentary Elegies is nominated for the Best Documentary Feature. Elegies was already selected as the opening film for the Hong Kong International Film Festival earlier this year, which was a rare occasion as poetry—the subject of the documentary—used to be a niche literary interest in the city. The first part of Elegies presents a sketching of contemporary Hong Kong poetry through interviews of Hong Kong poets and archival materials of Xi Xi and Leung Ping-kwan. The second and third part of the documentary are dedicated to two Hong Kong poets, Huang Canran and Liu Wai-tong, respectively, who both have deep cultural roots with Hong Kong but choose to live elsewhere. Hui studied literature at university, and poetry had long been a subject matter that the director wished to explore through the medium of the moving picture. The film is her way of paying homage to local poetry and the city, as well as an elegy for a bygone era.

To celebrate the nomination and achievement of Elegies, M+ Museum has organised a few screening sessions of the documentary in November. The November 18 screening includes a post-screening dialogue with the director and the featured poets, moderated by M+ film curator Li Cheuk-to. Ann Hui will discuss her ideas about poetry and the implications of poetry for her film productions. The three artists will engage in conversations on the essence of poetry, as well as their own stories of poetry writing. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Frontlines of World Literature

The latest literary news from Canada, Hong Kong, Ireland, and Spain!

This week, our team members bring us news from around the world, from worldbuilding at a conference in Canada to reflections on the ties between Ireland and Spain. Read on for more on a bilingual publication out of Hong Kong, and Irish press publishing literature from the Romanian diaspora, and more!

Heloisa Selles, Executive Assistant, reporting from Toronto, Canada

 It was the last Saturday of August when a crowd of speculative fiction lovers gathered to attend the AugurCon, in Toronto. It was the first in-person event promoted by Augur Magazine, a biannual publication that promotes Canadian and Indigenous voices writing fantasy, science fiction, and other uncommon forms of genre fiction. As a reader and an appreciator of the strange and unusual, I knew I had to be there.

As the afternoon went by—a mild, muggy breeze bringing spurts of rain and, consequently, people in and out of the venue—I noticed my perception of neighboring urban outlines changing, shaped by the imaginative perspectives on worldbuilding the conference highlighted. Author Larissa Lai, one of the participants of “The Speculative City” panel, spoke about utopia as more than the capacity to imagine something better (or as a concept on the flip side of pessimism), but as a continuous investigation that honors the function of the dream. What is better in the dream, and for whom? “The dream as we dream it may not come to pass,” she said, “but our dreams impinge on flows.” This lyrical statement about the ethics of creation reminded me of the proverb: “The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second-best time is now.” In SFF, creating new visions of what the world could become is also a way to keep the door open for those who will come after you, writers and readers alike.

Besides the panels, Augur also organized workshop AMAs with leading professionals in the publishing industry. I missed some discussions due to the overlapping agenda—and an enthusiastic, boisterous crowd—but I liked what I saw. I found the deliberate choice of keeping statistics out of discussion rather curious, especially in light of how BookTok helped boost sales in 2022 and fantasy genres went up 26.5% in sales in the first half of 2023, according to Publisher Weekly. Another overlooked but crucial aspect of publishing speculative fiction is the importance of funding for writers. This topic was partially addressed by a workshop about grants, which detailed the eligibility criteria for the Toronto Arts Council (TAC) Writers Program. In the federal sphere, the 2021-26 Strategic Plan created by the Canada Council for the Arts delineates how it is investing $1.6B in grants to authors to support artistic and literary creation.

The day was long and busy. As I packed up my modest book haul at the end of the one-day event, marinating in thoughts about fictional worlds, I noticed an old yearning being rekindled, the promise of being wrapped up in a fantastic story growing inside me. Maybe that is the primordial role of speculative fiction: to help us cope with real life by allowing us to step out of it, even if just for a little bit. READ MORE…

What’s New with the Crew? (Aug 2023)

Find out what our staff members have been up to when we’re not editing your favorite literary journal!

Editor-at-Large for Palestine Carol Khoury will be the guest editor of a special issue of the Jerusalem Quarterly, titled “Write-Minded: Jerusalem in Literature”; check out her call for submissions here or email her for further details.

Newsletter Editor Cody Siler published an essay in the Los Angeles Review of Books about  the impact of the American suspense writer Patricia Highsmith’s diaries on her critical reputation.

Chris Tanasescu aka MARGENTO, Editor-at-Large for Romania & Moldova, chaired in June the 5th edition of #GraphPoem at Digital Humanities Summer Institute, a “data commoning” hyper-platform performance involving hundreds of participants and watched by thousands of viewers online.

Nonfiction Editor Ian Ross Singleton translated four poems by Marina Eskina for Barzakh.

M.L. Martin has a new translation of the pre-10 c. Anglo-Saxon queer, feminist poet in the latest issue of Cordite.

Assistant Editor Megan Sungyoon‘s translation of The Cheapest France in Town by Korean poet Seo Jung Hak is scheduled to be published by World Poetry Books in October 2023.

Blog Editor Meghan Racklin’s essay on sore throats as illness and as metaphor was published in Full Stop and her review of The Light Room by Kate Zambreno was featured in The Brooklyn Rail.

Assistant Editor (Fiction) Michelle Chan Schmidt published a review of Owlish by Dorothy Tse, translated from the Chinese by Natascha Bruce, in Cha: An Asian Literary Journal.

Editor-at-Large for North Macedonia Sofija Popovska‘s Macedonian translation of the novella Im Kopf von Bruno Schulz by Maxim Biller was published in July by Makedonika Litera Press; additionally, “Thaumatropes”, a poetry collection she co-authored with Jonah Howell also appeared in July, published by Newcomer Press.

Copy Editor Urooj recently had two poems published in Gulmohur Quarterly‘s Issue 10, released in June 2023. They were also invited to share their poems at the Bangalore Poetry Festival, in Bangalore, India as one of four young, emerging poets in a panel called “Poems in Progress.”

*****

Interested in joining us behind the scenes? We’re still finalizing our mid-year recruitment drive—hurry and apply if you’d like to help power the world’s literature! 

Weekly Dispatches From the Frontlines of World Literature

Dispatches from Hong Kong, Central America, and India!

In this week of dispatches from around the world, our Editors-at-Large report on literary awards, the establishment of a literature museum, and book fairs! From controversy surrounding the new museum in Hong Kong to the most recent Indian texts in translation, read on to learn more!

Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

Public voices demanding for a museum of literature have been around for years in Hong Kong. On July 22, during the Hong Kong Book Fair 2023, Poon Yiu-ming, the Chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong Writers, announced that the Museum of Hong Kong Literature would be inaugurated in April next year in Wan Chai with support from Chief Executive Lee Ka-chiu and the Hong Kong Jockey Club. Poon petitioned Lee last year on the establishment of a literary museum. However, the announcement has attracted controversy in the literary arena. 

The concept of a museum for Hong Kong literature was proposed by a group of local writers and scholars, including Dung Kai-cheung, Tang Siu-wa, Yip Fai, Liu Waitong, and Chan Chi-tak, among others, who formed the “Hong Kong Literature Museum Advocacy Group,” in 2009. A signed petition that successfully solicited signatures from hundreds of local and international Chinese writers and scholars was published in Ming Pao, which proposed to establish a literary museum in the West Kowloon Cultural District. Since the suggestion was not adopted by the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority then, the Advocacy Group proceeded to establish the House of Hong Kong Literature as a non-governmental organization for promoting and preserving Hong Kong literature.

READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Frontlines of World Literature

The latest in letters from Hong Kong, Palestine, and Kenya.

This week, our editors are reporting on the intersection between literature and social movements. In Hong Kong, writers reflect on the June 4 protests at Tiananmen Square, in light of  the continual tensions between China and the island. In Palestine, a new podcast features writers orienting their own work within the \ body of Palestinian literature. And in Kenya, the country mourns the loss of revolutionary playwright Micere Mugo. 

Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

Since the National Security Law in Hong Kong came into effect in June 2020, the annual candlelight vigil for commemorating the June Fourth Tiananmen Square protests have not been organized for four years; the event’s host, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, was also dissolved in September 2021. Additionally, the event’s traditional venue, the Victoria Park in Causeway Bay, was under renovation and not available to be booked this year.

Although public commemoration was forbidden, remembrance could still be possible through writing; Cha: An Asian Literary Journal called for short submissions of reflections written about June 4, 2023—which could be directly, indirectly, or even not related to the event. The project, “Just Another Day”, also welcomed written works accompanied with photos or artwork. Fifty-four submissions were published on Cha’s blog, presenting a wide range of reflections from local and overseas writers. Translator Lucas Klein contemplates on the protest culture in Hong Kong and what he witnessed outside of the Victoria Park in his post, while Hong Kong poet Jennifer Wong contributed a prose poem on the importance of memory. Asymptote’s assistant editor of fiction Michelle Suen interweaves childhood nostalgia and postcolonial politics in her reflection, and I also tell a brief story of my personal experience of June Fourth over the years. Varied as they are, the texts testify to the unstoppable impact of the historical event, in both people’s mind and reality.

Meanwhile, as issue 72 of local bilingual poetry magazine, Voice & Verse, was just published, the magazine is organizing a reading session in collaboration with Cha, a crossover that echoes the issue’s English section theme: “Crossings”. The reading session will take place on July 12, hosted by Tammy Ho and Matthew Cheng. Local and international contributors to both journals have been invited to read their works. READ MORE…

What’s New in Translation: June 2023

New work from Shumona Sinha, Dorothy Tse, and Berta Dávila!

In this month’s selection of the best in translated literature, our editors present a selection of texts that range from the intimate, to the surreal, to the furious. From Galicia, a mother writes a poetic rumination of abortion and post-partum depression. From Hong Kong, a love story unfolds between two unlikely characters as the city clamours in protest. From France, an interpreter gives a searing account of the immigration system and its many failures, in the aftermath of her own violent act.

the dear ones

The Dear Ones by Berta Dávila, translated from the Galician by Jacob Rogers, 3Times Rebel Press, 2023

Review by Samantha Siefert, Marketing Manager

Five years after becoming a mother, a woman chooses to have an abortion. This uneasy duality forms the premise of Galician author Berta Dávila’s intimate, probing exploration of motherhood in her memoir, The Dear Ones, now available in an excellent English translation by Jacob Rogers. “It takes nine months for a child to form in the womb and be born, but no one knows how long it takes for a mother to do the same,” Dávila muses, never pretending to know or even seek a precise answer to the unstated question, instead dedicating this short but intense novel to articulating plainly the spaces between the themes of motherhood—the ones discussed openly, and the ones that are not.

READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

Literary news from Hong Kong, Central America, Kenya, and Nairobi!

In this week’s dispatches on world literature our editors-at-large bring news of secondhand book sales, prize winners, and self-published writers. From a conversations on freedom and creativity in Nairobi to a date with a book store in Hong Kong, read on to find out more!

Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

The closing of UK-based online bookstore Book Depository in April was shocking news to book lovers across the world, including regular customers from Hong Kong. Despite the convenient availability of digital books, many readers still prefer print books for both practical reasons and tactile feelings. Besides the satisfaction of turning real pages, the circulation of books is also part of the cultural scene of a city. The annual charity secondhand book sale “Books for Love @ $10” campaign was held in late April at Taikoo Place this year. A wide range of books, from arts and literature to bestsellers and manga, were on sale for HKD$10 each. The House of Hong Kong Literature also organised a secondhand book bazaar from 2 to 5 May as a way of fundraising to promote Hong Kong literature. The secondhand books were donated by local writers and scholars, covering subject areas of literature, philosophy, history, arts, and social sciences.

But in the digital age, brick-and-mortar bookstores struggle to sustain themselves, especially in a city like Hong Kong that constantly faces high rent and inflation. For three consecutive weekends beginning 29 April, independent local bookshop Hong Kong Book Era is hosting the event “A Date with Bookstores”, in which representatives from different independent bookstores are invited to set up their tables in Hong Kong Book Era to introduce their styles and thematic recommendations to readers. Participants include local bookstores such as HKReaders, Humming Publishing, and Little Little Books, as well as independent publisher Typesetter Publishing. Meanwhile, two talks—one on independent publishing and one on the history of Hong Kong independent bookstores—were also held, on 6 May and 7 May respectively, in connection with the event. The speakers discussed the mutual reliance between independent publishing and bookstores, as well as the vicissitudes of the struggles of Hong Kong’s bookstores. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

Dispatches from Central America, Sweden, and Hong Kong!

This week at Asymptote, our Editors at Large report on the use of artificial intelligence in publishing, the return of in-person events in Hong Kong’s literary scene, and exciting award announcements! From a new book of poetry to multi-disiplinary festivals, read on to learn more!

José García Escobar, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Central America

In February, Guatemalan poet Eduardo Villalobos published his latest book of poems entitled Ixtab (Catafixia Editorial), which draws inspiration from the Mesoamerican deity of suicide. Ixtab is Eduardo’s fourth book of poems, and he remains one of Guatemala’s most celebrated poets today. He has been invited to renowned festivals in Guatemala and around the world, such as the Copenhagen Literature Festival and the Festival Internacional de Poesía de Quetzaltenango.

Also in February, Slash and Burn by El Salvadorean writer Claudia Hernández and translated by Julia Sanches, was announced as the runner-up of the Premio Valle Iclán, awarded each year by the UK’s The Society of Authors. Hernández is the author of four novels and several short story collections and in 2004, she earned the prestigious Anna Seghers Prize. Slash and Burn was also shortlisted for the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute Translation Prize.

READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

The latest from Hong Kong, Guatemala, and the Czech Republic!

In this week’s roundup of literary news, we are paying tribute to the legacy of monumental writers. As Hong Kong mourns the recent loss of one of the country’s emblematic authors, Xi Xi, the Czech Republic commemorates the 100th anniversary of Jaroslav Hašek’s passing. In Guatemala, beloved writer of personal and continent-spanning histories, Eduardo Halfon, takes a new step into global recognition. Read on to find out more!

Charlie Ng, editor-at-large, reporting from Hong Kong

Renowned Hong Kong writer Cheung Yin, more commonly known by her pen name Xi Xi, passed away on December 18, 2022 from heart failure. Originally born in Shanghai, Cheung came to Hong Kong in 1950 at the age of twelve. She was educated at Heep Yunn School and the Grantham College of Education, and became a primary school teacher after graduation. Among her most prominent works are My City and Flying Carpet, both urban novels that reflect everyday lives and the transformation of Hong Kong. Another acclaimed novel, Mourning a Breast, is a semi-autobiographical work based on Cheung’s own experience of fighting breast cancer. Cheung also wrote poems and was prolific in essays, often published as articles for newspaper columns. Her most recent publications include the historical novel The Imperial Astronomer and the poetry collection Carnival of the Animals.

Loved by all generations of readers, Cheung is known for her playfulness, imagination, and experimental techniques. Blending real and fantastic elements, some of her works are described as embodying a style of “fairy-tale realism.” The Chinese characters of her pen name, Xi Xi 西西, represents the image of a little girl in skirt playing hopscotch. Cheung was awarded the Newman Prize for Chinese Literature and the Cikada Prize in 2019, and the Life Achievement Award of the 16th Hong Kong Arts Development Awards in 2022. A memorial service was held at Cheung’s alma mater, Heep Yunn School, on January 8 to commemorate her literary achievements, and on January 14, another memorial meeting was organised in Taipei, in which Hong Kong and Taiwan writers gathered to recite her works. Her translator, Jennifer Feeley, who translated Not Written Words and Mourning a Breast, also wrote a memorial, “A Translator Like Me” (available in both English and Chinese) to honour the lauded writer.

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Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

The latest in literature from Poland, Hong Kong, and Puerto Rico!

This week on Asymptote, we’re your eyes and ears for updates on award seasons, special national literature features, and postcolonial discourse and strategy. Polish literature is soaring at a high after celebrated adaptations and translations are introducing new readers to long-loved works. From Hong Kong, the national security law once again catalyses questions in its suppression of writing, even as local writers are seeing much love abroad. in Puerto Rico, writers are questioning US-backed funding and its entrapments. Read on to find out more.

Julia Sherwood, Editor-at-Large, reporting for Poland

Autumn is Poland’s award season, and this year saw the prizes go to a variety of genres. For the first time since 2009, NIKE, Poland’s most prestigious literary prize, went to a book of poetry: Jerzy Jarniewicz’s “erotically daring” collection Mondo Cane. Edward Pasewicz, whose novel Pulverkopf was also shortlisted, took home the coveted Angelus Prize for literature from Central Europe—only the second Polish book to win the accolade in the award’s twelve-year history. The Readers’ Angelus Prize went to Czech writer Jaroslav Rudiš for his novel Winterbergs letzte Reise, written in German and translated into Polish by Małgorzata Gralińska, and his publisher Książkowe klimaty scored another success with Bartosz Sadulski’s “literary fable and anti-historical reportage” Rzeszot, garnering the Kościelskich Prize.

Polish literature has enjoyed something of a boom in English, placing second in a recent survey conducted by The Bookseller, which is based on Nielsen BookScan data for the fifty-two weeks since April 16, 2022. The results show that in this period, translated fiction accounted for 11.4% of total fiction revenue, proving that we have moved even further from the proverbial 3%. Broken down into languages, 60% of the translations were from Japanese—unsurprising given that 99.7% of the total revenue was generated by manga. The next language, French, trailed at 6.1%, and Polish came in at third with 4.6%, beating translations from Italian, German, Spanish, Swedish, Russian, and Norwegian. Much of this success appears to be linked to Andrzej Sapkowski’s blockbuster fantasy The Witcher, which has filled the Game of Thrones-shaped hole on Netflix; the first two volumes of the eight-part saga were translated by Danusia Stok and the remainder by David French, who went on to translate his Hussite Trilogy. Olga Tokarczuk’s Nobel Prize has also contributed to this success, as has the fact that Polish literature was the market focus at the 2017 London Book Fair.

Here’s hoping that this interest will extend to a slew of recent translations from the Polish. According to Her, “a book-length interview with the Mother of God” by Maciej Hen (recently interviewed on the Asymptote blog by fellow writer Wioletta Greg), was published by Holland House in Anna Blasiak’s translation on November 3. On the same day, Penguin Books released Anna Zaranko’s long-awaited translation of The Peasants, one of Poland’s most famous twentieth-century epics by the 1924 Nobel Prize winner Władysław Reymont. In What We Leave Behind: A Birdwatcher’s Dispatches from the Waste Catastrophe, translated by Zosia Krasodomska-Jones and published by MacLehose Press on October 13, ornithologist and writer Stanisław Łubieński shows how consumer society has spun out of control, leading to the point of environmental catastrophe. Finally, Vine Editions, a new non-profit publisher based in Detroit with a focus on world literature, is about to bring out its first title, Piotr Paziński’s Bird Streets (Ptasie ulice) translated by Ursula Phillips. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

Literary dispatches from Croatia, Hong Kong, and India!

This week, our editors on the ground report on literary festivals, award winners, and exhibitions inspired by pivotal writings. From awardees of the Lu Xun Literature Prize to wide-ranging international programs, find out the latest news from the world of global letters below.

Katarina Gadze, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Croatia

The beginning of literary September in Croatia marked the tenth World Literature Festival, which ran from September 4 to 9 in Zagreb. The festival, a tradition for world literature aficionados throughout the region, has grown into an immersive experience for readers to see the best new works of world literature, meet novelists themselves, and listen to discussions regarding their works. This year, the festival brought forth a star-studded line-up of extraordinary international guests and talented authors—such as British writer Bernardine Evaristo, author of one of the most influential books of the decade, Girl, Woman, Other. 2020 Costa Book of the Year winner, Monique Roffey, also joined to share insight into their latest literary masterpiece, The Mermaid of Black Conch. On the local side of things, a talk on the heartbreaking novel/poem Djeca (Children) with its author, the Serbian writer Milena Marković, is also worth mentioning. Other foreign writers who took part in the festival’s fruitful discussions include Israeli writer Dror Mishani, Austrian novelist Karl-Markus Gauss, and German author Katharina Volckmer.

In Rijeka, the Croatian harbour city’s own literary festival, vRIsak, is also back for its fifteenth edition, in which both foreign and local literary voices flocked to the city’s new cultural center, the “Benčić” art district, to discuss contemporary writing and art. This year’s edition promised to be the most ambitious yet, with a lively program celebrating stories of emigrants, contemporary European poetry, and the city Mostar’s literary boom. On the topic of the latter, Mostar author Senka Marić, whose Kintsugi tijela (Body Kintsugi) will soon be published in English translation, spoke about the creative ambitions behind her latest novel Gravitacije (Gravitations). Another theme of this year’s festival was climate fiction, an ode to the healing potential of words in context to the rapid environmental changes of our time.

Last but not least, on September 22, Croatian Writers’ Association (Društvo hrvatskih književnika) organised a panel discussion on a hot topic in today’s literary scene, entitled “Literary Translation Today: Art or Transmission from Language to Language?” On the panel, numerous experts discussed what literary translators are up against in today’s competitive market, as well as the general lack of respect for such a demanding artistic process. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches from the Front Lines of World Literature

Literary news from India, Hong Kong, and Sweden!

In India, the country mourns the loss of Kerala’s groundbreaking tribal novelist. In Hong Kong, a genre-bending poet is being celebrated across the nation. And in Sweden, two talented writers have won the prestigious Klas de Vylder’s Grant Fund for Immigrant Writers. Read on to find out more!

Suhasini Patni, Editor-at-Large, reporting from India

On August 16, India’s first tribal novelist Narayan passed away in Kochi. Born in the Mala Araya tribe in Kerala, Narayan gained nationwide recognition for his book Kocharethi (1998), which won the Kerala Sahitya Akademi award. The book was a way to counter the misrepresentations of his community from outsiders, and Narayan struggled for ten years to find a publisher willing to release it; despite critical acclaim, many complained his work lacked literary merit. Translator Catherine Thankamma, who translated the text into English—winning the Crossword Book Award for it—wrote a tribute to him for Scroll.in. Her tribute honors the struggles and biases he faced in the literary world.

August has seen many new releases in translation. A significant one is Satya Vyas’s Banaras Talkies, translated from Hindi by Himadri Agarwal. A campus novel, the book is centered around three law students from Banaras Hindu University. The translation was facilitated by Ashoka Centre for Translation from Ashoka University, where Agarwal graduated from. According to Mohini Gupta’s review, “The Hindi novel seamlessly accesses Bhojpuri and English words and phrases and the translation captures these linguistic variations beautifully.”

Many translators in India are also turning to writing fiction. Aruna Chakravarti, winner of the Sahitya Akademi award for her translation of Sarat Chandra’s Srikanta, is known for her dedication to Bengali literature. Her first translation, Tagore: Songs Rendered into English, came out in 1984, and her critically acclaimed novels explore the lives of women in the household of Rabindranath Tagore. Her latest book, The Mendicant Prince, explores the Bhawal case—an extended court case from 1920-46 about a man claiming to be the prince of Bhawal. An excerpt of the book can be read here. READ MORE…