This week our writers report on the impact of coronavirus on writers and readers in China, as well as the release of the International Booker Prize longlist. Read on to find out more!
Xiao Yue Shan, Blog Editor, reporting from China
“Fear can cause blindness, said the girl with dark glasses, Never a truer word, that could not be truer. . .” The words of José Saramago hover in the virus-stricken towns and cities of China: illness, the great equalizer. The streets freed of people, the antiseptic taste of disinfectant wafting, mask-ridden faces—outside China, the news grow its own, furious legends. Reports of the dead waver between hundreds and thousands, there is panic and disillusion and boredom and most of all, uncertainty.
So it is through this continual trajectory of doubt, compounded by fear, that Saramago’s renowned novel Blindness (published in China as 失明症漫记) has surged amidst the Chinese literary community as a compass towards what directions human nature may turn in times of encompassing hardship. In the growing scope of a blindness epidemic, Saramago unites fiction and ideology into a profound portrayal into how disease can infiltrate and dismantle the lattice of moral order, as well as how we may comfort one another, how the degradation of societal norms does not definitively mean the regression of one’s humanity. It is, albeit dark, a story of triumph, and triumph—even in books—is solace.
As a great deal of the Chinese populace are avoiding public gatherings, both writers and readers have been combating cabin fever through internet reading platforms. Multiple online forums, such as QQ Books and 起点读书 (Start Reading) have made certain selections free to readers, resulting in an increased traffic of nearly one million individuals. Writers have also been documenting this time by publishing epidemic-related works; Prolific Wuhan novelist Fei Wo Si Cun 匪我思存 (pen name of Ai Jingjing 艾晶晶) has been steadily releasing vignettes of daily life in Wuhan under the title Wuhan Zhanji 武汉战记 (The Battles of Wuhan). The writing takes the form of journal, sorrowful and plaintive, faithful to the passing days:
今天武汉阳光灿烂，一个月就这样过去了。
有些人再也不能回家了，还有更多的人在继续英勇的战斗。
今天一位非常年轻的英雄离开了这世间，她才29岁，是一位2岁孩子的妈妈。她的父母爱人何其悲恸，那个牙牙学语的稚子，又如何能懂这次离别就是永别。
看到这条消息的时候我默默掉了一会儿眼泪，然后擦干了。
全市小区封锁，没有人可以出去送英雄一程，连她的至亲，也只能追在车后，嚎啕痛哭几声。
Today the Wuhan sun glitters. A month passes, just like this.
Some people can never go home again, other people are continuing the valiant battle.
Today, a very young heroine left this world, only twenty-nine years old, the mother of a two-year-old. How heartbroken her parents and lover must be, and that baby, not yet talking, how can a child understand an eternal separation.
After seeing this news I silently let one tear fall, and wiped it dry.
The whole city is blocked off, and no one can leave to send the heroine off. Even her family, they can only chase after the car, letting out a few painful, wailing sobs.
Tragedy is exhausting, as with as with all things threatened with never-ending. Today, there are many in China who mourn, and many who document their mourning, attempts to cure blindness.
Sarah Moore, Assistant Blog Editor, reporting from UK
Yesterday, the longlist for this year’s International Booker Prize was released, with a great number of small presses being included—nine of the thirteen nominated books are published by independent presses.
Fitzcarraldo Editions have two nominated books: The Other Name: Septology I-II by Jon Fosse, translated by Damion Searls from Norwegian and Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor, translated by Sophie Hughes from Spanish. Red Dog by Willem Anker and translated by Michiel Heyns from Afrikaans is published by Pushkin Press. Europa Editions’s The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar is translated from the Farsi. The translator has chosen to remain anonymous for security reasons.
The Eighth Life by Nino Haratischvili, translated by Charlotte Collins and Ruth Martin from German (Scribe UK) was previously reviewed at Asymptote and is an epic family saga, spanning six generations of a Georgian family. The Memory Police by Yōko Ogowa, translated by Stephen Snyder from Japanese (Harvill Secker) was also reviewed at Asymptote. It is a powerful and chilling work on the effects of state surveillance and totalitarian society.
Two French titles feature on the list: Michel Houellebecq’s Serotonin, translated by Shaun Whiteside (William Heinemann), and Emmanuelle Pagano’s Faces on the Tip of My Tongue, translated by Sophie Lewis and Jennifer Higgins (Peirene Press). Argentinian Samantha Schweblin has been nominated for the third time for Little Eyes, translated by Megan McDowell (Oneworld).
In total, the list features eight languages: Afrikaans, Dutch, Farsi, French, German, Japanese, Norwegian, and Spanish. The full list of nominations can be read here. The award celebrates translation by splitting the £50,000 prize evenly between writer and translator. The shortlist will be announced on 2 April, and the winner on 19 May.
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Read more dispatches on the Asymptote blog: