Tag Archives: subfeature

Hubert Klimko-Dobrzaniecki and the Greeks that came to (and left) Poland

Greeks Go Home To Die  is the latest novel published by Polish writer Hubert Klimko-Dobrzaniecki, the book having been brought out by Znak in June 2013. An excerpt of the novel translated by Julia and Peter Sherwood appeared in B O D Y’s Sunday European Fiction and as a follow up here is a transcript […]

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Interview with translator Will Firth

The latest story in B O D Y’s Sunday European Fiction, the Macedonian “Artist of the Revolution” (as well as next week’s Russian story) was translated by Berlin-based translator Will Firth. Below is an interview in which Firth talks about the various languages he translates from, the difficulties of breaking into the right translating circles […]

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B O D Y 1st Birthday Bash

Prague-based literary journal B O D Y is celebrating a year of publication this coming Thursday, July 11th at Prague’s Anglo American University Library, so anyone in the vicinity is invited to attend a reading that includes Joshua Weiner (USA), Yang Lian (CHINA), Yo Yo (CHINA), Natashia Deón (USA), and Milan Děžinský (ČR) along with […]

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Literary roundup: Pushkin and Russian bombs

“Russia’s regular historical paradox is that its rulers want one thing but the result is often something entirely different. Peter the Great wanted to strengthen the empire, but instead he placed a bomb beneath it, which destroyed it. In our time, Gorbachev wanted to save communism and instead he buried it.” Author of Maidenhair, Mikhail […]

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Book World Prague 2013 report in Publishing Perspectives

Here’s what I wrote about the Prague book fair for Publishing Perspectives, covering the significance of Slovakia as the Guest of Honor, poetry being a focus of the fair and various ups and downs facing the Czech book industry, such as the insanely high VAT tax on books and the impending arrival of Amazon. On […]

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Literary roundup: The Szentkuthy renaissance and Odessan letters

At Hungarian Literature Online (HLO) there is a very thorough summary of the efforts by translator Tim Wilkinson and Contra Mundum Press to bring Hungarian writer Miklós Szentkuthy (1908–1988) into the international prominence many feel he deserves. The latest Szentkuthy work published in English is his Marginalia on Casanova, with Towards the One & Only […]

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Literary roundup: Kafka’s latest metamorphosis

Kafka’s work has been transformed into many, many things. There are of course film and TV adaptations, graphic novels and the like. I’m sure there’s a Franz Kafka action figure and probably one of a bug with a backdrop of Prague. There was even a porn star (okay, maybe actor – I have no idea […]

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Literary roundup: Literature in translation 2013 and Topol’s deviltry

Chad Post has put up this year’s Translation Database at the halfway point (60% or so complete – download the xl here). The list is for US releases so there are a lot of books mentioned here that aren’t on it because they came out in the UK. Here are some random observations on the […]

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Amoz Oz wins Franz Kafka Prize

The Prague-based Franz Kafka Society has awarded this year’s Franz Kafka Prize to Israeli writer Amos Oz. Oz is coming to the award ceremony that will take place in October and I hope, like 2011 winner John Banville did, will come to Kafka Society HQ to speak more informally, read from his work and take […]

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Murder Ink

The next two weeks of B O D Y’s Sunday European Fiction will be devoted to dark stories of crime and death. First up is the brutal opening of Polish crime writer Mariusz Czubaj’s novel 21:37, just published by Stork Press in a translation by Anna Hyde. This is the award-winning writer’s first book to […]

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