This week, our writers around the globe are celebrating the ever-growing interest in literature from countries that have been underrepresented in translation. In Slovakia, our Editor-at-Large looks back over the best works of the last thirty years, as well as the biggest literary prize-winners of 2019. In Argentina, acclaimed singer Adrián (Dárgelos) Rodríguez releases his debut poetry collection, and a new program in narrative journalism is launched in Buenos Aires. In Uzbekistan, we review two new English translations of major Uzbek classics. Read on to find out more!
Julia Sherwood, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Slovakia
As 2019 drew to a close, the customary best-of lists in Slovakia were topped by Čepiec (The Bonnet), a difficult-to-classify blend of ethnographic and historical exploration, social criticism, and autobiographical psychological probe—the first foray into prose by the acclaimed poet Katarína Kucbelová.
The anniversary of the Velvet Revolution of November 1989 prompted a number of searches for the best literary works produced over the past thirty years. The most comprehensive survey, on PLAV.sk (Platform for Literature and Research), invited one hundred and thirty scholars, critics, writers, translators, and publishers to pick the best book of poetry, fiction, literary nonfiction, and criticism. Štefan Strážay’s collection Interiér (1992, The Interior) garnered the highest number of votes in the poetry category, with past Asymptote contributor Peter Macsovszky’s 1994 collection Strach z utópie (Fear of Utopia) coming a close second. The fiction list was dominated by Peter Pišťanek’s prescient dystopian satire Rivers of Babylon (1991, trans. Peter Petro, 2007), followed by his Mladý Dônč (Dônč Junior, yet to be translated into English) and cult author Rudolf Sloboda’s novel Krv (1991, Blood). As for “best writer,” the top four—Pavel Vilikovský, Balla, Ivana Dobrakovová, and Peter Pišťanek—all luckily have books available in English. More information on Slovak literature is available on the portal SlovakLiterature.com (full disclosure: I launched this website with Magdalena Mullek in September 2019 to promote Slovak literature in English).
In September 2019, Slovakia’s most prestigious literary prize, the Anasoft Litera, went to Jedenie (2018, Eating) by Ivan Medeši, the enfant terrible of ethnic Ruthenian literature, who lives in Vojvodina, a multi-ethnic province of Serbia. His book actually had to be translated into Slovak by Maroš Volovár—quite a feat, since the language spoken by its characters (outsiders on the margins of society who indulge in drugs and alcohol) is extremely colourful. Interestingly, the book Anasoft Litera readers picked as their favourite—Milo nemilo (2018, Nice Not so Nice) by Milo Janáč—also revolves around drinking and features a similar cast of characters, as do the grotesque stories in the collection Virtuóz (2018, Virtuoso) by Václav Kostelanski, which won this year’s René Prize, chosen by secondary school students.
Kostelanski is an alumnus of the Poviedka (Short Story) competition that has been running for twenty-three years. In recognition of this achievement, the competition’s initiator and tireless organiser, the publisher Koloman Kertész Bagala, was awarded the Tatrabanka prize for the arts in December 2019. Bagala, who has discovered some of best contemporary Slovak writers (including past Asymptote contributors Balla and Marek Vadas) has also republished seminal authors of the older generation, such as the literary critic Valér Mikula and the magic realist Václav Pankovčin. One of the writers who Bagala has championed is Dušan Mitana (1946-2019), who took his own life last year, shortly before the publication of his final book Nezvestný (2019, Missing). Nezvestný is a mosaic of his life, composed of short stories, diary entries, and interviews. One of these stories, “Signs,” also appeared in BODY.literature, translated by Magdalena Mullek.
Allison Braden, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Argentina
Adrián Rodríguez grew up reading. Inspired by Jean Cocteau’s 1929 novel Les enfants terribles, he adopted the last name Dárgelos—a nod to a character noted for his good looks, arrogance, and freedom from convention. As Adrián Dárgelos, Rodríguez became an enfant terrible himself, rearranging popular ideas of Argentine rock music as the lead singer of Babasónicos, a band at the heart of Argentine New Wave rock in the late 1980s and early 1990s. As critic Gustavo Álvarez Núñez writes, “In an age when Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for Literature, Dárgelos may be the best narrator of Argentine literature in recent history” (my translation). Now, at age fifty-one, Rodríguez has released a debut collection of poetry, Oferta de sombras (Editorial Sigilo). The thirty-one poems in the collection range in subject, betraying their author’s persistent curiosity at the world he lives in—and his persistent desire to unmake that world. Though the poems are largely divorced from his work as a rock star, Rodríguez embodies the French concept of the enfant terrible as he speaks uncomfortable truths in verse—onstage and on paper.
Another debut of note: the Universidad Nacional de San Martín, a public university in Buenos Aires, has launched a master’s in narrative journalism, the first program of its kind in Latin America. Longform narrative journalism, popularized by magazines like The Atlantic and New Journalists like Hunter S. Thompson, has historically been associated with the United States, but the genre—a fusion of journalism and literature—is taking hold worldwide. The introduction to UNSAM’s two-year program highlights the genre’s importance and utility in narrating and reconstructing diverse, contradictory realities, and conveying the many meanings in contemporary life—a critical skillset in a country riven by political and economic polarization.
Filip Noubel, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Uzbekistan
Something has changed on the Anglophone map of world literature: the Central Asian country of Uzbekistan has finally been declared worth of attention, and a number of publishers have at last found the courage to venture into an unknown literary landscape. Stubborn translators who for years have been begging to publish the treasures of one of the greatest literary traditions of Central Asia have been vindicated: a huge benefit for Anglophone readers.
Two new translations of major classics of early twentieth-century Uzbek literature came out in English in late 2019, signifying a growing appetite for Uzbek fiction. Interestingly, both titles, O’tkan Kunlar and Kecha va Kunduz, as they are known in Uzbek (a Turkic language spoken today by over thirty million people, predominantly in Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan) are the works of Jadid authors: Abdullah Qodiriy and Abdulhamid Cho’lpon. The term refers to a group of intellectuals who attempted to reform Uzbek culture from the late nineteenth century to the 1930s; their modernist project included a language reform, the introduction of new literary forms such as the novel, the implementation of rights for women, and attempts to reorganize society by looking at alternative political models including Japan, the Ottoman Empire, and France. Overall, their efforts aimed to emancipate their people from their own oppressive traditions, as well as from Tsarist Russia’s colonialism.
While O’tkan kunlar was published in a magazine in 1922, and Kecha va Kunduz appeared in 1936, both authors met the same fate: perceived as representatives of a progressive, national elite challenging Soviet authority and ideology, they were arrested, tortured, and shot dead, like dozens of other Jadids. Both Qodiryi and Cho’lpon died in October 1938 at the height of the Stalinist purges. Their works were banned and denied republication until the late 1980s, when the Soviet Union started to relax ideologically.
O’tkan Kunlar (Bygone Days), by Abdullah Qodiriy, was translated from the Uzbek by Mark Edward Reese and published by the Muloqot Cultural Engagement Program in 2019. Often described as the first Uzbek novel, the book is set in the mid-nineteenth century in the Khanate of Kokand, which would soon succumb to Tsarist Russia’s military expansion in what was then called Turkistan. While the main plot is a traditional tale of star-crossed lovers, Otabek and his beloved Kumush, the lengthy novel operates as a small encyclopedia of Uzbek traditions, ethnography, and social norms—this probably explains why it gained cult status in Uzbekistan. According to Mark Edward Reese, the translator, Qodiriy chose the form of a historical novel to write “about the past as an allegory of his present circumstances, thus as a warning to future generations. In that process he hoped to form a sense of ‘Uzbekness.’ This is one of the reasons why the novel is even often quoted by current Uzbek President Mirziyoyev.” This is also why the book is perhaps the best introduction to Uzbek culture, and a perfect entry point for readers unfamiliar with the cultural background of Central Asia.
Kecha va Kunduz (Night and Day) by Abdulhamid Cho’lpon was translated from the Uzbek by Christopher Fort and published by Academic Studies Press. Cho’lpon’s book is the only surviving part of a trilogy that takes places in 1916 in the Ferghana Valley, back then under Tsarist Russian rule. The first plot builds around Zebi, a young woman, who is forced by her father to marry a successful and influential landlord and official who accommodates Russian interests. The second plot focuses on the same official’s steward, Miryoqub, who initially has no qualms about serving the Russian masters of the land, yet as in a proper Bildungsroman, he gradually awakens to the ideals of the Jadids and undergoes an ideological change. Cho’lpon’s prose is enriched by his experience as a poet and a playwright, his exploration of socialist realism, and his deep knowledge of Persian culture, making the reading of his rich and nuanced prose a real feast. This is echoed by translator Christopher Fort, who explains that “the novel circulated among the intelligentsia in secret throughout the life of the Soviet Union. Many Uzbek authors were intrigued by its composition and style, and some even allude to it in their works”—and one of the most interesting aspects of Cho’lpon’s prose is indeed his exploration of language. At the time, a new literary Uzbek language was ”tested” by the different Jadid intellectuals, as they were trying to distance themselves from the literary Chaghatai language, an official Turkic court language used across Central Asia, while incorporating words from local dialects. Indeed, Uzbekistan—as it is now known—had never existed as a unified country, only as a patchwork of various khanates that built their culture and language around a main historical city. In this regard, the book is well served by a detailed introduction describing the life of Cho’lpon and the literary and political context of the time, as well as a glossary of historical terms. Reader, rest assured: cultural glosses apart, you are in for compelling storytelling. Anguished love, cunning plots, witty jokes, and salivating recipes will make your journey memorable—which will all, hopefully, will make you read more Uzbek literature!
*****
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