The Best Translated Book Award Finalists 2017

Hello Gentle Reader

This year’s Best Translated Book Award, is as eccentric, eclectic and exciting; as to be expected from the award. The longlist of twenty five novels and ten poetry collections was diverse which strengthened the awards objectives and mission. No two novels were alike. The themes were wide ranging and human in universal appeal; which allowed for the list to be a unique quilt and patchwork of languages and styles. The following is this year’s shortlisted works of fiction in no particular order:

Marie NDiaye – France (Exile-Germany) – “Ladvine,”

Stefan Hertmans – Belgium – “War and Turpentine,”

Boubacar Boris Diop – Senegal – “Doomi Golo,”

Pedro Cabiya – Dominican Republic – “Wicked Weeds,”

Ananda Dev – Mauritius – “Eve Out of Her Ruins,”

Antonio di Benedett – Argentina – “Zama,”

Daniel Saldaña Parí – Mexico – “Among Strange Victims,”

Sergei Lebedev – Russia – “Oblivion,”

Lúcio Cardos – Brazil – “Chronicles of a Murdered House,”

Laia Jufresa – Mexico – “Umami,”

This years shortlist is just as strong as its predecessor. However, it is striking to see which authors and their respective works who have been omitted from this year’s shortlist. I had expected Boubacar Boris Diop and his novel “Doomi Golo,” to be on this year’s shortlist, and am happy to see Marie NDiaye is also included on the list. The omission of László Krasznahorkai, was a shocking sight this year. Generally speaking, whenever the Hungarian master of the apocalypse is nominated for a award, he is usually inducted on its short running list, and more or less considered the bookie favourite to win. This year to see his short novel “The lost Wolf and Herman,” to be excluded from this year’s shortlisted titles, is a paradox of disappointment and joy; disappointment, because there can be no denying, Krasznahorkai as a literary master and international giant of literature, and the elimination of his novel as a front runner, appears slightly taboo and insulting; while on the other hand, there is great joy, to see László Krasznahorkai take a back seat this year, while other writers and their works are promoted in favour of him, offering a greater breath of fresh air for the award. It is personally shocking to see Maja Haderlap and her novel “Angel of Oblivion,” not included on this year’s shortlist. The language of “Angel of Oblivion,” was poetic and personal in touch. The beginning of the novel is its greatest strength; its baroque like language and description of the mundane and magical daily routine of the farm, where the young girl is left in wonder and awe at the mystical and occult traditions of her grandmother, whose wisdom and experience is a guiding factor of the young girls early life, as her parents are almost incapable of raising a child, let alone living together with a sense of civil cohabitation, and these issues would later be explored later in the novel, as the narrator does her best to understand and comprehend the dark scars history, had left on her father, mother and grandmother, as the narrator slowly is left to inherit the mess of memories, along with the grief and guilt alongside. The novel itself was a great piece of testimony, but lacked the cut and dry perspective of a purely academic or historical approach; rather with poetic language, baroque memories, and a light personal touch on the border of autobiography, Maja Haderlap, created a wonderful novel of language, division, grief, guilt and memory, which happened to include historical points of reference.

Pedro Cabiya and his novel “Wicked Weeds,” is one of the more surprising works inducted on this years shortlist. The novel “Wicked Weeds,” carries the subtitle: “A Zombie Novel," which did not strike great confidence in me. Yet upon further research, the novel appears allegorical in nature, as it grapples with the concept of what it means to be human, but also the ecological and environmental apocalypse which may await all of us around the corner. Both Mexican writers made it onto the shortlist, in favour of two well known giants of Spanish literature: Javiar Marias and Enrique Vila-Mattas. The Spanish language also retains the most represented language on both lists: with nine writers and books, working in the language on the longlist, and now four writes appearing on the shortlist. In all though Gentle Reader, the shortlist is just as strong as its predecessor, in a more condescended version. Though I initially thought Maja Haderlap, Patrick Modiano, and Laszlo Krasznahorkai, would have been included on the shortlist, with their respective works.   


The following Gentle Reader, is the poetry shortlist for this year's award. Again the list is not presented in any particular order:

Abdellatif Laabi – Morocco – “In Praise of Defeat,” 

Yideum Kim – (South) Korea – “Cheer Up, Femme Fatale,”
Szilárd Borbély – Hungary – “Berlin-Hamlet,”
Alejandra Pizarnik – Argentina – “Extracting the Stone of Madness,”
Michael Donhauser – Germany – “Of Things,”

I make no qualm or issue about stating openly and frankly that I do not read poetry, and have little appreciation for poetry. Though I confess adamantly my love and admiration for Wisława Szymborska, among a few other poets; and have done my best to advocate personally and privately the genius of Doris Kareva (Estonia), Hasso Krull (Estonia), Sirkka Turkka (Finland) and Tua Forsström (Swedish Language/Finland), among other poets who I happen to discover online. But beyond reading one or a couple poems, by a minimal pantheon, is as far as my poetry reading goes. I am not a digester of poetry collections or poets, though I often wish to learn from them and their unique sense and feel for language. My admiration for poets is only apparent with vehement conviction is when they turn their pen from the line to the sentence, and their poems become prose.

Of the poets shortlisted for this year’s poetry, only two appear familiar:Abdellatif Laâbi a well known man of Moroccan letters, but has been forced into exile into France, after being arrested and tortured for crimes of opinion. Laâbi though is regarded as one of the most prominent and important voices of poetry to have come out of Morocco. I am familiar with Alejandra Pizarnik from New Directions Books, which has been introducing her work into the English language over the past few years now, as well as being on the Best Translated Book award shortlist for poetry back in two-thousand and fifteen. Though I find Pizarnik’s poetry heavy handed and a bit unmoving, her life itself is interesting, though tragic. At the age of thirty-six, Alejandra Pizarnik committed suicide. Despite her tragic end and short career, Alejandra Pizarnik was noted for being a poet who was profoundly uninterested in politics, and her poems never went into the political atmosphere of discussion. Pizarnik’s poems were rooted in the symbolic and romanticism of European poets such as Arthur Rimbaud. Alejandra Pizarnik tuned and toned her poems towards subjects of death, childhood, pain, and loneliness. In it she wrote dense poems which reflected the unfortunate and unforgiving world which surrounded her. With her tragic death and short career, she is considered a legendary poet of Argentina and a formidable force of the Spanish language and Latin/South American literary culture.  There they are Gentle Reader, the shortlists for this year’s Best Translated Book Award 2017, both for fiction and poetry. Of the two lists, it appears the Spanish language is represented the most frequently with a combined total of five works originally written in the language; four from the fiction shortlist and one from the poetry shortlist. Still the award is anyone’s game from now on, and the judges have their work cut out for them, as they work to adjudicate the best book to be awarded this year’s Best Translated Book Award.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader

Take Care

And As Always  

Stay Well Read

M. Mary