The latest issue of The Hungarian Quarterly is out and contains an interview with László Krasznahorkai, whose novel Satantango is due to be published in February. The issue also has an excerpt from the book. Other articles of interest include an interview with pianist and regular NYRB contributor Charles Rosen talking quite a bit about the legacy of Franz Liszt. There are also some interesting articles about early modernist Hungarian painting, including an excerpt from “How ‘Fauve’ Are the Hungarian Fauves?” and a lecture on the absence of Hungarian (and Central European) art and music from “our consciousness of the mainstream of modern European art.”
For Russophiles there is the latest issue of Chtenia (unavailable online). The theme for the current issue is sport and it contains an excerpt from Anne O. Fisher’s new translation of Ilf and Petrov’s The Twelve Chairs, namely “The Interplanetary Chess Congress.” There are also excerpts from Anna Karenina (the scene where Levin is contemplating the cosmos while a fly ball drops untouched on the ground in front of him? Or maybe the mushroom-picking scene – for some people that is a competitive sport). There is also work by Yuri Olesha, Alexander Kuprin and Vladimir Vysotsky.
For living Russian writers you can turn to Russia beyond the Headlines, where there is an interview with Mikhail Shishkin, whose novel Maidenhair, translated by Marian Schwartz, will be published by Open Letter Books and his recent Big Book award-winning Pismovnik (Letter-Book) is already being translated by Andrew Bromfield.
Photo – Window from the Strasbourg Cathedral by Ecelan/Wikimedia
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