As I've repeatedly mentioned (the last time: here), The New York Times Book Review is under new leadership (Sam Tanenhaus is out, Pamela Paul is in), and I've been nervously wondering what would become of it (yes, foolishly I hold out hope that it might be salvaged, despite how it's just a shadow of its pre-Tanenhaus self (long pre-Tanenhaus, I should add: he's not solely responsible, but he sure helped sink the ship faster than I would have thought possible).
As longtime readers know, I frequently carped about Tanenhaus' extremely limited coverage of anything in translation (and his unwavering predilection for re-translations and books-by-dead-authors on the rare occasions when he did allow anything in translation to be covered in these pages).
In the first few -- surely also still transitional (i.e. with a big Tanenhaus imprimatur still very noticeable throughout) -- issues things haven't looked good (i.e. different, much less better).
Now comes the 12 May issue, which proved to be something of a roller-coaster ride from the ridiculous to the sublime for me:
Here I found:
THE BAD -- no, 'bad' or 'awful' or 'outrageous' doesn't even begin to describe it.
The first article from the issue to be made available online, several days ago (i.e. long before the bulk of the issue) was yet another installment of the relatively new 'By the Book' feature -- Q & As with authors (an idea that has some potential -- depending, of course, both on the authors selected and on the questions posed).
So far, they haven't won me over with what they've done with this -- and I thought they had scraped the bottom of the barrel a couple of weeks ago, when they already gave us what nobody possibly needed -- an Isabel Allende Q & A -- but it turned out I wasn't even close.
No, with this week's episode, a Q & A with a young woman whose only claim to fame is that she has been accused of murder (and against whom legal proceedings in that case are not yet closed), my heart sank as it seemed clear to me that it was all over: with this The New York Times Book Review had finally, definitively, irredeemably (and reprehensibly) jumped the shark.
Paul is no doubt getting many pats on the back and congratulations for it: I'm sure that it's gotten a ton of page-views -- probably more than almost any NYTBR in recent times. But come on, this is tabloid stuff that's unworthy of the NYTBR.
But then, when they posted the complete issue, I also found:
THE GOOD: a review of a book in translation ! A review of Arnon Grunberg's Tirza, no less -- i.e. something really worthy of their (and your) attention. By a living author ! Never previously translated !
True, the book came out almost three months ago -- but, hey, better late than never. (I won't rub it in that my review of it was posted in 2009 ... whoops, I guess I will .....)
(I hope that the NYTBR review helps give the book an apparently sorely needed boost -- though even as I post this, when the review has been available online for a few hours, the Amazon Best Sellers Rank (as their 'sales rank' is apparently now called) of the novel is still only a dismal 444,052 (i.e. it has had zero impact so far).
Come on, people: this is similar to Herman Koch's (NYTBR bestseller !) The Dinner in how it unfolds (and both how dark and how comic it is), but it's a far superior work. (Same translator, too.))
And, finally, there was also this:
BEYOND WORDS: Yes, I was thrilled to see the review of Tirza, and then to see that there were reviews of two more books in translation -- unbelievable ! But ... well, you know what's coming, right ? The reviews are of a collection of Nikolai Leskov stories, and of Albert Camus' Algerian Chronicles. That's right: two dead authors, and one of the books a collection of re-translations.
Sigh.
I'm laughing through the tears.
Old (bad) habits apparently die really, really hard.
As longtime readers know, I frequently carped about Tanenhaus' extremely limited coverage of anything in translation (and his unwavering predilection for re-translations and books-by-dead-authors on the rare occasions when he did allow anything in translation to be covered in these pages).
In the first few -- surely also still transitional (i.e. with a big Tanenhaus imprimatur still very noticeable throughout) -- issues things haven't looked good (i.e. different, much less better).
Now comes the 12 May issue, which proved to be something of a roller-coaster ride from the ridiculous to the sublime for me:
Here I found:
Paul is no doubt getting many pats on the back and congratulations for it: I'm sure that it's gotten a ton of page-views -- probably more than almost any NYTBR in recent times. But come on, this is tabloid stuff that's unworthy of the NYTBR.
But then, when they posted the complete issue, I also found:
THE GOOD: a review of a book in translation ! A review of Arnon Grunberg's Tirza, no less -- i.e. something really worthy of their (and your) attention. By a living author ! Never previously translated !
True, the book came out almost three months ago -- but, hey, better late than never. (I won't rub it in that my review of it was posted in 2009 ... whoops, I guess I will .....)
(I hope that the NYTBR review helps give the book an apparently sorely needed boost -- though even as I post this, when the review has been available online for a few hours, the Amazon Best Sellers Rank (as their 'sales rank' is apparently now called) of the novel is still only a dismal 444,052 (i.e. it has had zero impact so far).
Come on, people: this is similar to Herman Koch's (NYTBR bestseller !) The Dinner in how it unfolds (and both how dark and how comic it is), but it's a far superior work. (Same translator, too.))
And, finally, there was also this:
BEYOND WORDS: Yes, I was thrilled to see the review of Tirza, and then to see that there were reviews of two more books in translation -- unbelievable ! But ... well, you know what's coming, right ? The reviews are of a collection of Nikolai Leskov stories, and of Albert Camus' Algerian Chronicles. That's right: two dead authors, and one of the books a collection of re-translations.
Sigh.
I'm laughing through the tears.
Old (bad) habits apparently die really, really hard.