The Complete Review Guide to Contemporary World Fiction

M.A. Orthofer

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780231518505
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism History & Theory
• Index: Literature

A user-friendly reference for English-language readers who are eager to explore contemporary fiction from around the world.

Profiling hundreds of titles and authors from 1945 to today, with an emphasis on fiction published in the past two decades, this guide introduces the styles, trends, and genres of the world's literatures, from Scandinavian crime thrillers and cutting-edge Chinese works to Latin American narco-fiction and award-winning French novels. The book's critical selection of titles defines the arc of a country's literary development. Entries illuminate the fiction of individual nations, cultures, and peoples, while concise biographies sketch the careers of noteworthy authors. Compiled by M. A. Orthofer, an avid book reviewer and the founder of the literary review site the Complete Review, this reference is perfect for readers who wish to expand their reading choices and knowledge of contemporary world fiction.

"A bird's-eye view of titles and authors from everywhere?a book overfull with reminders of why we love to read international fiction. Keep it close by."—Robert Con Davis-Udiano, executive director, World Literature Today "M. A. Orthofer has done more to bring literature in translation to America than perhaps any other individual.[This book]will introduce more new worlds to you than any other book on the market."—Tyler Cowen, George Mason University

"A relaxed, riverine guide through the main currents of international writing, with sections for more than a hundred countries on six continents."—Karan Mahajan, Page-Turner blog, The New Yorker

APPENDIX 1

Translation into English, by the Numbers

The claim that only about 3 percent of all books published in the United States (with Great Britain occasionally thrown in for good measure) are translations has gained a great deal of currency over the past decade and continues to be widely cited. It appears, however, to be an essentially anecdotal statistic, only very roughly based on any actual data and, beyond its shock value, is of only limited use.

Even a baseline—a percentage of what, exactly?—is difficult to determine with any accuracy. The “traditional print book output” in the United States was estimated in 2011 to be 347,178 (translations are not counted separately). This includes new editions of previously published work, including paperback editions of last year’s hardcovers.¹ Self-publishing and print-on-demand, the bulk of it being public domain works, accounted for more than a million additional titles published in 2011, further inflating and complicating the numbers.

UNESCO’s Index Translationum is billed as a World Bibliography of Translation but is marred by the often inadequate data submitted to it.² In 2008, the most recent year for which data are available, the United States had 1,431 translated titles. Year-to-year disparities (2,195 translated titles in 2007), which are even more pronounced in the case of other nations, also suggest that the database is, at best, incomplete. In addition are the many duplicate entries and new editions of previously published translations. All in all, the Index Translationum offers only very limited guidance as to how much—and what—has been translated into English in any given year.

The Translation Database kept at Three Percent is currently the most comprehensive effort to track translations in the United States.³ Maintained since 2008, the database counts all new translations of adult fiction and poetry that are published in the United States. This is by no means a complete register, however, as it does not include any nonfiction, children’s literature, cookbooks, or religious and reference works, which account for a significant number of translations annually. It also does not include either new editions—or new translations—of previously translated work, which make up a large percentage of the titles in translation published each year. Because the database is limited to titles that are published or have a distributor in the United States, it also does not include many titles translated into English but published elsewhere, even though many of these books are readily available to American readers via online vendors and distributors.

Nevertheless, the database offers a good crude idea of how much new trade fiction is published in translation in the United States every year—the books that you might find at your local bookstore or that your library stocks. Astonishingly, for 2014 only 494 works of fiction, including anthologies, are listed; in 2013 there were only 448. In addition, translations from three languages—French, German, and Spanish—dominate, routinely accounting together for more than 40 percent of all translations.

Additional translations into English that are published abroad—mainly in India, but also elsewhere—add to the worldwide total, but by any calculation, translation into English lags far behind that into other major languages. Precise foreign data also are difficult to find, but by comparison, the German Publishers and Booksellers Association, for example, reports that out of 81,919 new releases in Germany in 2013, 10,731 were translations into German—although these totals include nonfiction and children’s literature.⁴

NOTES

1.   “Publishing Market Shows Steady Title Growth in 2011 Fueled Largely by Self-Publishing Sector,” June 5, 2012, Bowker, http://www.bowker.com/news/2012/​290244861.html (accessed August 4, 2015).

2.   United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, Index Translationum, www.unesco.org/xtrans (accessed April 27, 2015).

3.   Translation Database, Three Percent: A Resource for International Literature at the University of Rochester, www.rochester.edu/College/translation/​threepercent/index.php?s=database (accessed April 27, 2015).

4.   “Economic Figures for the Industry, 2013,” Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels, http://www.buchmesse.de/images/​fbm/dokumente-ua-pdfs/2014/​buchmarkt_deutschland_branchenkennziffern​_2014_englisch.pdf_45273.pdf (accessed October 16, 2015).

APPENDIX 2

Supplemental Resources

PERIODICALS AND ONLINE RESOURCES

Major American newspapers and magazines do cover some international fiction, but they generally review very little fiction in translation. British periodicals are somewhat better in both regards. Among publications primarily available in print (almost all now also have an online presence, though not all material is fully and/or freely accessible), the best coverage of foreign titles and authors can be found at:

• World Literature Today (www.worldliteraturetoday.org)

• Review of Contemporary Fiction

• Times Literary Supplement (www.the-tls.co.uk)

• Bookforum (www.bookforum.com)

Several websites also offer extensive reviews of foreign works, notably:

• Complete Review (www.complete-review.com)

• The Modern Novel (www.themodernnovel.org)

• Quarterly Conversation (www.quarterlyconversation.com)

• Three Percent (www.rochester.edu/College/translation/threepercent)

In addition, a steadily increasing number of blogs offer news about and reviews of international literature.

Other websites with a focus on international literature with both original content and essays and reviews include:

• Words Without Borders (www.wordswithoutborders.org)

• Asymptote (www.asymptotejournal.com)

Smaller literary magazines such as Mānoa (http://manoajournal.hawaii.edu/) often devote issues to specific regions or languages.

Many countries have national book offices and organizations that promote domestic literature abroad, and most of these now have an online presence that also provides at least some information in English. These sites vary greatly in quality but are often very useful; a good example is Dutch Foundation for Literature (www.letterenfonds.nl/en/).

The excellent independent regional resources online range from the Literary Map of Africa (https://library.osu.edu/literary-map-of-africa) to Albanian Literature in Translation (www.albanianliterature.net).

Various organizations that are dedicated to cross-cultural exchange, such as Literature Across Frontiers (www.lit-across-frontiers.org), also provide information and material of interest.

A comprehensive list of all these sites can be found at www.complete-review.com/guide.

Foreign publishers’ websites often provide information (almost always in English) about titles they would like to sell or for which they have sold the foreign rights. This can be a useful way of learning about new titles that are not yet available in the United States or Great Britain or that have not yet been translated into English.

PUBLISHERS

The major publishing houses in the United States and Great Britain do publish some foreign literature, including most of the biggest blockbusters, but the smaller independents publish the bulk of foreign fiction, especially in translation.

Many independents have carved out niches for themselves:

AmazonCrossing	Popular contemporary fiction in translation
American University in Cairo Press	Contemporary Arabic fiction
And Other Stories	Contemporary international fiction
Archipelago Books	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction
Ariadne Press	Austrian fiction
Dalkey Archive	Press Mainly twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction
Dedalus	Mainly twentieth- and twenty-firstcentury international fiction
Deep Vellum	Contemporary international fiction in translation
Europa Editions	Mainly contemporary international (largely European) fiction
Frisch & Co.	Contemporary fiction (solely in e-book format)
Gallic Books	Popular contemporary French fiction
Glas	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century Soviet and Russian fiction
Green Integer	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction and poetry
Hispabooks	Contemporary Spanish fiction in translation
Host Publications	Contemporary international fiction
Interlink	Contemporary international fiction, especially from the Middle East
New Vessel Press	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction
New York Review Books	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction
Open Letter Books	Contemporary fiction in translation
Peepal Tree Press	Mainly Caribbean fiction
Peirene Press	Contemporary European fiction
Pushkin Press	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century European fiction
Seagull	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century international fiction
Telegram	Contemporary international fiction
Twisted Spoon Press	Twentieth- and twenty-first-century
	Central and Eastern Europe fiction

Other noteworthy commercial publishers that publish significant amounts of fiction in translation are New Directions, Marion Boyars, and Peter Owen.

Several publishers specialize in genre fiction:

Bitter Lemon Press	Mainly contemporary crime fiction in translation
Haikasoru	Contemporary Japanese science fiction and fantasy
Soho Press	Contemporary English-language crime fiction with foreign locales
Vertical	Contemporary popular Japanese fiction

Many American university presses have series devoted to contemporary as well as classical fiction in translation, covering specific regions, languages, and genres. These often are small series, with, at best, a few titles added annually, but many are very strong, such as Northwestern University Press’s Writings from an Unbound Europe.

Relatively few books published abroad are widely distributed in the United Stated and Great Britain—your local bookstore is unlikely to carry many—but Internet booksellers and lower postal rates have made obtaining them easier and cheaper. Publishers in countries such as Australia, India, and South Africa bring out many worthwhile titles that do not find American or British publishers but can be ordered directly from them or local booksellers. Among the most impressive outlets of titles published abroad is the African Books Collective (www.africa...