Spring 2024

Editor's Note

Shout it from the rooftops: Asymptote turns eleven today! We celebrate our 43rd issue with new work from a record 43 countries in our most bountiful edition yet. Highlights include an exclusive interview with acclaimed poet George Szirtes and a Flemish Literature Special Feature organized in partnership with Flanders Literature, showcasing new translations of International Booker Prize nominee Stefan Hertmans, YA superstar author Bart Moeyaert, and up-and-coming raconteur Rachida Lamrabet.

Our Winter 2022 edition not only puts the “world” in “world literature,” it also interrogates the meaning of it. Take the case of Aaron Zeitlin, the Yiddish poet who was stranded overseas when the Nazis invaded his native Poland and killed his entire family. Written in a language “half of whose speakers had been wiped off the face of the earth,” Zeitlin’s grief-stricken poetry appears to be without a world, and therefore can not, as Yeshua G.B. Tolle argues beautifully, be classified as world literature. In her fiction, Jasna Jasna Žmak imagines a similar apocalyptic fate for the speakers of her language in a thought experiment inspired by Barthes, only to emerge with a newfound appreciation for all the words in her language, including the ones she hates. After all, words can summon entire civilizations—even the bygone ones—as they do in Gesualdo Bufalino’s thrilling list of extinct professions (the lady with the bloodsuckers, among them!). “The disappearing world” is also the subject of visual artist—and the first public figure in Spain to openly discuss his HIV status—Pepe Espaliú’s devastating poems evoking his final days under a sky dense like “the mouth of black clouds.” By contrast, bilingual Kazakh poet Anuar Duisenbinov’s exuberant “overloved, overdosed” narrator “float[s] in exaltation” through his “luminous and windy capital,” contemplating “the ability of speech to sprout.” As it turns out, speech does sprout everywhere all over the world. Alongside Duisenbinov, we’re thrilled to debut in English Emil-Iulian Sude, one of the first award-winning writers of Roma ethnicity in Romania; Rachid Djaïdani, a French filmmaker whose 1999 bestselling novel and classic of banlieue writing is only now available, thanks to frequent contributor Matt Reeck; and Kim Su-on, a young Korean writer whose dazzlingly atmospheric story is a masterclass in worldbuilding.

The tagline of this eleventh anniversary edition is “The Worlds We Live In”—pointedly not “The World We Live In”—meant to express the simultaneity of all our myriad existences, such as those inhabited by George Szirtes, who discusses his new collection of poems, the state of Hungarian literature, and translation in the age of Brexit. Also working from the liminal space of migration is Jamaican-born artist Cosmo Whyte, who explains why Barbados’s recent renouncement of the Queen is only the first of many necessary steps in healing (since, according to him, there is no “post” to colonialism). Neske Beks also performs a necessary act toward healing on behalf of Black women everywhere by centering the story of Ann Lowe, the Black designer responsible for Jackie Kennedy’s bridal gown in 1953, in her retelling of haute couture’s history. Pair her 2020 essay sparked by an exhibition with Charlotte Van den Broeck’s nonfiction excavating the curious real-life case of the Princess Caraboo of Javasu aka Mary Wilcocks—who might very well be the first yellowface captured in any artistic medium (an 1817 oil painting that shared a moment with Van den Broeck at the Bristol Museum & Art Gallery in her last gallery visit before the pandemic). All of this is illustrated in talented Singaporean guest artist Yeow Su Xian (Shu)’s irresistible palette and forms—I dare you to say hers isn’t the most fun cover we’ve had in a while!

For more Asymptote goodness, subscribe to our newsletter or Book Club, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and our two Instagram accounts, bookmark our daily blog, and consider submitting work (Swedish-English translators take note: our recently announced call for submissions to a paid Swedish literature feature ends Mar 1). And of course, we’d be delighted if you’d like to come on board as a team member (apply by Feb 1) or, to honor our eleven full years in world literature perhaps, as one of our generous sustaining members! As always, thank you for your readership and support.

—Lee Yew Leong, Editor-in-Chief

Editorial Team for Issue January 2022

Editor-in-Chief: Lee Yew Leong (Taiwan/Singapore)

Assistant Managing Editors: Daljinder Johal (UK/India), Marina Martino (UK), Janet Phillips (UK/Australia), Lindsay Semel (Portugal/USA), and Michal Zechariah (USA)

Section Editors:
Lee Yew Leong (Taiwan/Singapore)
Bassam Sidiki (USA/Pakistan)
Caridad Svich (USA/UK)
Barbara Halla (Albania)
Eva Heisler (Germany/USA)

Editor of Special Feature on Flemish Literature: Lee Yew Leong (Taiwan/Singapore)

Assistant Editors: Alyea Canada (USA), Whitney DeVos (Mexico/USA), Sabrina Greene (USA), Jaedyn Hedman (USA), Shawn Hoo (Singapore), Gabriela Lemos (USA), M.L. Martin (Canada), Maya Nguen (USA), Andreea Scridon (UK/Romania), Megan Sungyoon (South Korea), Fairuza Hanun Razak (Indonesia), Alex Tan (Singapore), Laurel Taylor (Japan/USA), and Lin Chia-Wei (Taiwan)

Contributing Editors: Ellen Elias-Bursac (USA), Aamer Hussein (UK), Sim Yee Chiang (Singapore), Dylan Suher (USA), and Adrian West (USA)

Translation Tuesdays Editor: Shawn Hoo (Singapore)

Art Director: Lee Yew Leong (Taiwan/Singapore)

Director, Educational Arm: Kent Kosack (USA)

Editor-at-large, Argentina: Josefina Massot
Editor-at-large, El Salvador: Nestor Gomez
Editor-at-large, Guatemala: José García
Editors-at-large, Hong Kong: Jacqueline Leung and Charlie Ng Chak-Kwan
Editor-at-large, Japan: David Boyd
Editor-at-large, Lebanon: MK Harb
Editor-at-large, Mexico: Alan Mendoza Sosa
Editor-at-large, Palestine: Carol Khoury
Editor-at-large, Romania and Moldova: MARGENTO
Editor-at-large, Slovakia: Julia Sherwood
Editor-at-large, Uzbekistan: Filip Noubel
Editor-at-large, Vietnam: Thuy Dinh

Masthead for Issue January 2022

Fiction, Poetry, Interview, and Special Features: Lee Yew Leong
Nonfiction: Bassam Sidiki
Drama: Caridad Svich
Criticism: Barbara Halla
Visual: Eva Heisler
Illustrations and Cover: Yeow Su Xian (Shu)

Assistant Managing Editor (supervising issue production): Janet Phillips

Assistant Managing Editors (supervising Assistant Editors): Lindsay Semel and Marina Martino

Assistant Managing Editor (supervising Editors-at-Large): Daljinder Johal

Chief Executive Assistant: Rachel Farmer

Senior Executive Assistants: Angela Bulgari and Julie Shi

Blog Editors: Darren Huang and Xiao Yue Shan

Newsletter Editor and Art Director: Lee Yew Leong

Guest Artist Liaison: Berny Tan

Senior Copy Editors: Anna Aresi, Samantha Kirby, and Rachel Stanyon

Copy Editors: Nadiyah Abdullatif, Andrea Blatz, Bella Bosworth, Sophie Hoffman, Matilde Ribeiro, Liam Sprod, and Maggie Wang

Technical Manager: József Szabó

Director of Outreach: Georgina Fooks

Assistant Director of Outreach: Ka Man Chung

English Social Media: Ruwa Alhayek, Samantha Mateo, and Oliva Roslansky

Spanish Social Media: Sergio Serrano, Sofia Monzó, and Madeline Robinson

French Social Media: Filip Noubel

Chinese Social Media: Jiaoyang Li and Jessica Wang

Graphic Designer: Michael Laungjessadakun

Communications Manager: Julian Strachan

Director, Educational Arm: Kent Kosack

Educational Arm Assistants: Katarzyna Bartoszynska, Mary Hillis, Thirangie Jayatilake, and Anna Rumsby

Book Club Manager: Alexandra Irimia

Asymptote would like to acknowledge the support especially of:

as well as Lien Devos, Elise Vanoosthuyse, Patrick Peeters, Yannick Geens, Adrian Flückiger, Rosemary Freriks, Louise Law, Anton Hur, and Munawwar Abdulla.

For their generous donations this past quarter, our heartfelt thanks go too to A J Gray, Annetta Riley, Benjamin Saff, Beth Raps, Brother Anthony of Taizé, Chris Tanasescu, Constanze Wehnes, Cynthia Whitehead, Daniel Hahn, Diana Senechal, Dora Zhang, Dustin Simpson, Elisabeth Brock, Forrest Gander, Gail Newman, Genia Blum, Gesture Press, Gina Caputo, Harold Augenbraum, Heidi Holzer, Jared Davis, Jeffrey Boyle, Jenna Colozza, John Hanlon, Ju-Chan Fulton, Judith Vollmer, Katarzyna Bartoszynska, Katie Boynton, Katrine Jensen, Kent Kosack, Lara Norgaard, Lawrence Flood, Lisa-Maria Schantl, Lynn O'Neal, Madeline Levine, Mallory Truckenmiller, Marguerite Feitlowitz, Marjolijn de Jager, Mark Cohen, Martin Ingebrigtsen, Mary Olivanti, Matthew Mazowita, Michaela Jones, Mo O'Mahony, Monty Reid, Nhi Ta Huong, Nicholas Graham, Nora Bojar, Phuong Anh, Roberto Tejada, Sidney Wade, Stiliana Milkova, Thomas Carroll, Thuy Dinh, V. Lee Harrison, Velina Manolova, William Justice, Xiangxiu Meng, and Yann Martel.

We are also thrilled to welcome new sustaining members Phoung Anh, Lynn O’Neal, and Diana Senechal.

Back

Fiction

Jasna Jasna Žmak, from My Dear You

Translated from the Croatian by Samantha Farmer

I read recently, in an essay by Barthes, an anecdote about a tribe that deletes one word from their language every time one of its members dies, putting the word out of circulation as an act of remembrance.

Rachid Djaïdani, from BUnKer

Translated from the French by Matt Reeck

Oh man! Spilling my guts about my family isn’t really what I’d had in mind for my little composition.

Jorge de Sena, A Tribute to the Green Parrot

Translated from the Portuguese by David J. Bailey

That the Green Parrot was from Brazil, and the Grey Parrot from Angola, was one of the first axioms of biology that I learned.

Dmitry Glukhovsky, Sulphur

Translated from the Russian by Marian Schwartz

Have you seen the clouds over the city? That’s all from the smokestacks. Those aren’t real clouds. It’s the sulphur.

Kim Su-on, A Ray of Light

Translated from the Korean by Spencer Lee-Lenfield and Lizzie Buehler

There is a lake of small size in the woods.
It is there that the only light shines.

Poetry

Pepe Espaliú, from Through These Five Years

Translated from the Spanish by Ian Russell

I want to create a different death
another death, a death all my own

Anuar Duisenbinov, from Metamorph

Translated from the Kazakh and Russian by Mariya Deykute and Victoria Thorstensson

a couple of months ago i was called the Disgrace of the Great Kazakh Nation
just because someone saw me on the street with my long hair /fabulous, by the way/

Emil-Iulian Sude, Four Poems

Translated from the Romanian by Diana Manole

Starting today i’ll try to fall asleep, not die.

Nóra Ružičková, from Contemporaneities

Translated from the Slovak by Ivana Hostová

option I: are we ahead of our time?
option II: is our time ahead of us?
option III: . . . ?

Dag T. Straumsvåg, Four Poems

Translated from the Norwegian by Robert Hedin and Dag T. Straumsvåg

I’m always a little late for the goings-on in my life.

Kim Myŏng-sun, Five Poems

Translated from the Korean by Eunice Lee

A road, a road of serenity.
Souls, freed, reunite at this road of serenity,
this road above my head.

Csenger Kertai, Two Poems

Translated from the Hungarian by Diana Senechal

Yet I love you!—You are a miscomposed coherence.

Vicente Huidobro, Fated Passenger

Translated from the Spanish by Leijia Hanrahan

Here is the darkened stone or first stoplight of the infinite
irresistible like the eyes of vertigo

Nguyen Quang Thieu, from Slaughterhouse

Translated from the Vietnamese by Nguyen Quang Thieu and Bruce Weigl

He is a pharaoh buried deep in the catacombs of loneliness with all of his languages.

Adriano González León, The Site of Paradise

Translated from the Spanish by Maria Anna Zazzarino

all the world is for them, and we, we are still in this poor little school, its roof half-torn by the gale, while the consumptive teacher tells her pupils, also consumptive, that this might have been the site of paradise.

Criticism

Patrick Chamoiseau and Rodolphe Hammadi, French Guiana: Memory Traces of the Penal Colony

Translated from the French by Matt Reeck

A review by Michael Reyes Salas

This timely publication arrives during an era in which French governmental and academic institutions have recast a spell of collective amnesia.

Salim Barakat, Come Take a Gentle Stab

Translated from the Arabic by Huda J. Fakhreddine and Jayson Iwen

A review by Tom Abi Samra

What Fakhreddine and Iwen have given us, in English, is not only a gift of language, but a philosophy of life.

Tomaž Šalamun and Joshua Beckman, Tomaž

Translated from the Slovenian by Joshua Beckman

A review by C. Francis Fisher

The true thrill of Tomaž is Beckman’s ability to make the reader feel as though we are talking to Šalamun ourselves in the comfort of his living room.

Fiston Mwanza Mujila, The River in the Belly

Translated from the French by J. Bret Maney

A review by Kate Prengel

The River in the Belly is a complex, frustrating, and ultimately rewarding collection of poems.

Alejandro Zambra, Chilean Poet: A Novel

Translated from the Spanish by Megan McDowell

A review by Richard Cho

Without a doubt, Chilean Poet is his best work yet, generously infused with nostalgic tenderness, original humor, and Zambraesque storytelling vitality.