36th anniversary of Arno Schmidt's death
Arno Schmidt passed away 3 June 1979, and while we wait for the publication of John E. Woods' epic translation of his Bottom's Dream (likely still a ways away) you can read up on the master in...
View ArticleMarina Warner on global fiction
In The Guardian yesterday Alison Flood previewed Marina Warner's William Matthews Memorial Lecture last night, in Man Booker International judge speaks out against lack of world literature in...
View ArticleFranz Kafka Prize
They've announced that the 2015 Franz Kafka Prize, awarded annually for the: "artistically exceptional literary production of a contemporary author whose work addresses readers regardless of...
View ArticleSeveneves review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Neal Stephenson's new novel, Seveneves. This novel is 861 pages long -- but that only makes it the sixth (!) longest...
View ArticleHoracio Castellanos Moya Q & A
Both parts of Caitlyn Christensen's Q & A with Horacio Castellanos Moya at Sampsonia Way are now up, here and here. Four of his works are under review at the complete review (e.g....
View ArticleWomen's Prize for Fiction
They've announced that How to Be Both, by Ali Smith, has won the Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly Orange; currently sponsored by some liquor (pardon: liqueur) firm). I still haven't...
View ArticleStephen King on translation
Stephen King is featured in this week(end)'s 'By the Book' Q & A in The New York Times Book Review, and among the questions posed to him were: Do you enjoy fiction in translation ? Stories...
View ArticleKatara Prize for the Arabic Novel
The Katara Prize for the Arabic Novel is a new, big-money prize for Arabic fiction,and in Al-Ahram Weekly Nourhan Tewfik 'sums up the debate surrounding Qatar's new literary prize', in A prize...
View ArticleJapanese literature abroad
In The Japan News Mariko Ozaki reports on a recent international symposium held in Seoul where they considered: 'The present and future prospects of Japanese-language literature within the...
View ArticleWales Book of the Year Awards
They've announced the Wales Book of the Year Awards, with Other People's Countries taking English-language-fiction top honors (see the Vintage publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.co.uk)...
View ArticleBefore and During review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Vladimir Sharov's Before and During. As I mentioned just over a week ago, this book, in Oliver Ready's translation, won...
View ArticleLudvík Vaculík (1926-2015)
Czech author Ludvík Vaculík has passed away; see, for example, the report in The Prague Post. Open Letter reissued his novel The Guinea Pigs a few years ago; see their publicity page, or...
View ArticleAmitav Ghosh Q & A
The Times of India has an IANS Q & A with Amitav Ghosh, who has just released the last volume of a trilogy. Among the reveals: "I love appam and idiyappam". But anyone who approves...
View ArticlePremio Rómulo Gallegos
Among Spanish-language novel prizes the premio Internacional de Novela Rómulo Gallegos is hard to top: winning titles include One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, Terra...
View ArticleEnrique Vila-Matas reviews
The most recent additions to the complete review are my review of two Enrique Vila-Matas titles that New Directions is publishing ... today (with the first coming to the UK in a Harvill Secker...
View ArticleHebrew literature, in and outside Israel
In Forward Haim Weiss argues Israel Doesn't Have a Monopoly on Great Hebrew Literature -- writing in response to the Sapir Prize for Hebrew Literature changing its rules to now limit the award...
View Article(Fake) Czech classics
At Radio Praha Ian Willoughby has a Q & A with David Cooper about the Rukopis královédvorský and the Rukopis zelenohorský -- two medieval Czech texts discovered in the nineteenth century...
View ArticleCalligraphy Lesson review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of The Collected Stories by Mikhail Shishkin, Calligraphy Lesson, recently out from Deep Vellum.
View ArticleIcelandic literary scandal ?
Hey, it's a small country, so you can't expect too much, literary-scandal-wise -- but this does involve The Ambassadors- and The Pets-author Bragi Ólafsson. He apparently wrote a...
View ArticleGerman literature in ... Taiwan
At DeutscheWelle Holger Heimann reports that 'translations of German bestsellers are particularly en vouge' [sic -- but you know what they mean] in Taiwan, in Reading between the lines in...
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