Found in Translation

A mysterious e-mailer has informed me of this article about an initiative to get more people reading literature in translation.

In an innovative effort to raise the visibility of literature in translation, two nonprofit literary presses and a small indie house have formed an alliance with two corporate imprints to coordinate a special promotional display called Reading the World, which launches May 1 at about 80 independent bookstores.

Each participating store will display a total of 10 works in translation—two each from Dalkey Archive Press, Archipelago Books, New Directions, FSG and Knopf/Pantheon—and will stock about five copies of each title.

Participating stores—which include 57th Street Books in Chicago, Cody's Books in Berkeley, Calif., Northshire Books in Manchester, Vt., and Reader's Oasis in Tucson, Ariz.—have selected their 10 titles from a pool of 20 recommended by the publishers. Among the options are Voices from Chernobyl, an oral history by Ukrainian author Svetlana Alexievich; the novels Bacacay by the Polish writer Witold Gombrowicz and By Night in Chile by Roberto Bolaño; The Collected Poems of Federico Garcìa Lorca; and a memoir in graphic novel form, Embroideries by Iranian author Marjane Satrapi.

FWIW, Archipelago--which apparently does only works in translation--has already comped me a copy of A Dream in Polar Fog, which looks to be a lead title of theirs and looks very good. I know I'll be dropping by Cody's to see what works in translation they're featuring.

Comments

[tito]

kind of sad that they will only stock 5 copies of each "featured" title -- though as an industry outsider I don't know if this is good, bad or possibly even ugly.

for what it's worth, I found By Night In Chile very good.

[Dan Wickett]

That probably isn't too horrible a number actually - looking at B&N's Discovery Selections or Borders Original Voices: they usually only seem to carry about 15 copies of these, which are discounted in price and don't have the "problem" of being labeled translated.

Of course, those 15 or so copies are what are on display, I have no idea if they're stocking many more in the back.

Enjoy,

[Scott]

Tito,

Lots on indies actually often only buy 1 or 2 copies of a new title. They just have to be careful. I'm sure, though, that if there is demand for these books, they will restock past those 5.

[bookdwarf]

5 is a good number, especially since some of the books are backlist. And as you said, if the demand is good, they'll get more. It's just nice to see translations get some publicity.

[Bud Parr]

I posted on this back in March:
http://www.chekhovsmistress.com/2005/03/promoting_liter_1.html

The only reason I mention this is that the current reports seem to exclude Robert Gray's involvement, a bookseller with a blog that i link to in my post.

[Scott]

Bud,

I remember the Robert Gray post, but I did not realize that he was also part of this collaboration. Thanks for correcting me on this.

[Bud Parr]

Actually, I just went back and read Gray's post - He doesn't actually say he started it or anything - he's involved by blogging about the books and he is a bookseller. Just wanted to clarify.

His site is
http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/members/shire15/