Language: Spanish

Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

March 1, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Diána Vonnák, Garrett Phelps, Jacob Silkstone, and Nina Perrotta

Your weekly guide to biggest news in world literature.

We’re starting this month with news of literary awards, festivals, and translation parties to distract you from the last few weeks of winter! From the Bergen International Literary Festival and a Mother Tongues translation party to the European Union Prize for Literature and the PEN America Literary Awards, we have you covered with all of this week’s most important literary news.

Jacob Silkstone, Assistant Managing Editor, reporting from the Bergen International Literary Festival, Norway

A literary event in Bergen, Norway’s second largest city and Europe’s wettest, doesn’t quite feel complete without a few minutes spent outside the venue—some people smoking, some talking with the writers, some watching the rain drip slowly into their beer. At Bergen’s first International Literary Festival, all participants were presented with free umbrellas, but the weekend (an extended weekend, beginning on Valentine’s Day and ending on February 17th) was miraculously close to remaining rain-free.

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Translation Tuesday: “The Fox-Terrier” by Mempo Giardinelli

February 26, 2019  |  in Translations  |  by Cameron Baumgartner

An even greater silence fell, as if all the sound and noise of the world had died in that plaza.

An impactful feature of “The Fox-Terrier” is the way in which the opening paragraph throws the boundary between fiction and nonfiction into doubt as the narrator mentions a personal detail which is also true of the author: that he has written a book called La revolución en bicicleta, which the real-life Mr. Giardinelli published in 1980. Although Mr. Giardinelli asserts that “The Fox-Terrier” is purely fictional, the use of this true detail as a framing device for the untrue narrative which follows lends the story’s climax a chilling believability. The reader is left wondering, Could it be that this terrible thing really happened? This question leads, in turn, to a larger consideration of human nature and its capacity for cruelty, and the way human evil returns again and again throughout history “like a neverending Piazzolla tango.”

—Translator Cameron Baumgartner

 

In This is Not the End of the Book, a conversation about books and reading by Umberto Eco and Jean-Claude Carrière, the authors mention a story by Restif de la Bretonne, a French novelist from the eighteenth century whom I haven’t read, that is similar to a story my father used to tell, and which in 1980 I almost included in my book La revolución en bicicleta.

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Barbeque for Underground Poetry: Death and Life in the Subaltern Circles of the Buenos Aires Literary Scene

February 25, 2019  |  in Essays  |  by Lara Norgaard

It was a space where anyone could perform anything, where anyone could consume anything, where the bathroom was not for the faint of heart.

Image credit: Andrés Toledo Margalef

It was hard to say goodbye to El Pacha. Tomorrow is the day, they would say, and then they’d say the same thing the next day, until half a month had passed. Finally, one day, they went into the patio and looked up at the unusual tree, its old roots amassed in concrete, and tore it to the ground. Anyone who wanted to could take a limb. Later, they returned to take chunks out from the wall in the library. On the final day—at least, what is remembered as the final day—they started throwing all of El Pacha’s innards out onto the street: decrepit couches, decorative broken TVs, pieces of wood, empty cases of beer, everything, out into the tiny alley that lies on the border between the neighborhoods of Villa Crespo and Almagro. They sat on the couches and, as in a cremation or medieval execution, lit the pile of debris on fire. They took out sausages and large cuts of meat from their bags and began to roast them over the licking flames. With the exception of that unusual feast, they spent the rest of the funereal night doing what they always had done: they drank, played guitar, and took turns reading their poetry aloud.

El Pacha was an important space in the Argentinian underground poetry scene until it closed roughly one year ago, in March 2018. It had operated illegally out of the second floor of a spindly residential apartment building; participants would be informed of weekend events through an email listserv, Facebook pages, or word of mouth. Though the space passed away, El Pacha still serves as an example of how writing is a community process and provides a window into how politics and economics mold the unique structure of Buenos Aires’ literary scene.

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

February 22, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by José García Escobar, Marek Maj, and Olufunke Ogundimu

New Guatemalan publications, a feminist conference, as well as awards in translation feature in this week's literary updates!

This week brings notable translations of up-and-coming Guatemalan authors, an insightful conversation between two Nigerian writers, and the announcement of highly-regarded translation prizes in the UK. If you’ve been searching for exciting new writers and translators, look no further!

José García Escobar, Editor-at-Large for Guatemala, reporting from Guatemala

In early December, Ugly Duckling Presse (UDP) put out No Budu Please, a selection of poems by the Guatemalan and Garifuna author Wingston González, translated by the Puerto Rican poet Urayoán Noel. No Budu, which has been favorably reviewed by Columbia Journal, Verse, and PANK, marks the first time Wingston’s work has been published in the United States. Additionally, Wingston’s book place of comfort has been incorporated into artist Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa’s performance and installation Heart of the Scarecrow, which will be on exhibit through March 9 at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada.

Across the pond, independent publishing house Charco Press is bringing another Guatemalan author into the English language. Celebrated short story writer Rodrigo Fuentes published a collection called Trucha panza arriba in Guatemala in 2017. Since then, the book has been reissued in Bolivia by Editorial El Cuervo and in Colombia by Laguna Libros. Trucha was even longlisted for the Premio Hispanoamericano de Cuento Gabriel García Márquez. And as of February 7, thanks to researcher and translator Ellen Jones, Trucha is now available in English as Trout, Belly Up. You can read one of the stories from the collection in our Winter 2019 issue.

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An Alternative Valentine’s Day Reading List

February 14, 2019  |  in Essays  |  by Chloe Lim, Jonathan Egid, and Nina Perrotta

St Valentine is the patron saint not only of lovers, but also of beekeepers, greetings, epilepsy, travelers, and the plague.

If Valentine’s Day doesn’t get your heart racing, Asymptote has something different to offer this February 14. Read on for sinister mansions, absent wives, and the ambivalent origins of Valentine’s Day as a celebration of love!

This Valentine’s Day, consider instead the often terrible odds that romantic endeavours will succeed, the relationships that end mysteriously, and the partners that vanish without a trace. This is exactly what happens in Taiwanese author Wang Ting-Kuo’s English debut, My Enemy’s Cherry Tree (Granta Books, April 2019), translated from the Chinese by Howard Goldblatt and Sylvia Li-Chun. First published in 2015, the novel has already won all major Taiwanese literary awards and is set to make a spectacular entrance into the English literary scene.

The novel is a first-person retrospective narrative by an unnamed protagonist who has set up a small cafe by the sea, waiting for his missing wife, Qiuzi, to return to this spot, her favourite along the coast. The initial premise is simple: Qiuzi, dissatisfied with the narrator’s absence, his financial lack, and his unintentional neglect of her, disappears one morning into the arms of Luo Yiming, a philanthropist and Qiuzi’s photography tutor. The unnamed protagonist’s narration is then triggered by Luo’s chancing upon the cafe, setting in motion an encounter that drives Luo mad. As the story unfolds, however, the truth of the matter becomes increasingly less certain, complicated also by the appearance of Miss Baixiu, Luo’s daughter, who haunts the cafe daily in an attempt to ‘heal’ the protagonist’s soul. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

February 8, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Charlie Ng, Kelsey Woodburn, Lou Sarabadzic, and Paul M. Worley

Join as us we celebrate indigenous writers, intercultural connection, and the importance of linguistic diversity.

This week, we return with three dispatches exploring multicultural and multilingual connection. We begin with a reflection on the work of Humberto Ak’abal, an influential Indigenous poet who wrote in both K’iche’ Maya and Spanish. We also explore the multilayered dialogue between China and New York in the Hong Kong literary scene, and get an exciting firsthand account of the recent Creative Multilingualism conference in the UK.

 Paul Worley and Kelsey Woodburn, Editors-at-Large, reporting from Guatemala

As declared by the United Nations, 2019 is the International Year of Indigenous Languages. According to their website, of the 7,000 languages currently spoken on the planet, over 2,500 are currently endangered. In Mexico, the rest of Latin America, and around the world, many hope this global recognition will lead to wider acceptance of Indigenous languages, as well as to increased opportunities for their oral and written expression.

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What’s New with the Crew? A Monthly Update

February 7, 2019  |  in News  |  by Sasha Burik

Catch up with the latest from our very international staff!

Curious about what our team has been up to in 2019? Read about our staff’s many achievements in the new year, including publications, art exhibitions, and reviews. 

Writers on Writers Editor Ah-reum Han received a distinguished mention in The Best American Short Stories 2018 for a story of hers originally published in StoryQuarterly.

Communications Manager Alexander Dickow’s latest book, Appetites, was reviewed on The Blunt Post by Linda Rijel.

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An Interview with Asja Bakić

February 6, 2019  |  in Interviews  |  by Lindsay Semel

It seems to me that people today tend to underestimate Eros in literature when it’s obvious that the best books are full of it.

Asja Bakić’s short-story collection Mars, translated by Jennifer Zoble, is slated for release by the Feminist Press in March of 2019. Though she’s a prolific poet, short-story writer, translator, and blogger in the former Yugoslavia, Mars will be her first publication in English. Bakić grew up in a turbulent Tuzla, Bosnia, lives now in Zagreb, Croatia, and laments the limitations that national borders place on literary exchange. The twists and turns in her speculative narratives leave readers suspended in a heady no-man’s-land between Earth, Mars, and the moon; life, death, and purgatory. Bakić speaks with Asymptote’s Assistant Editor Lindsay Semel about translation, Eros in literature, and the proliferation of ideas.

Lindsay Semel (LS): You often participate in literary events around the former Yugoslavia and Eastern Europe. Can you tell me about what you’re seeing there? What interests or bothers you? What trends are emerging? Which voices are notable? How is it different for you, interacting in virtual and physical spaces as an artist?

Asja Bakić (AB): Well, I am seeing my friends. We all know each other. Most of us were born in the same country in the eighties; the language is still the same if you ask me. It doesn’t matter if I go to Belgrade, Novi Sad, Skopje or Tuzla—it feels like home. The problem is that the crude political divide doesn’t let us read each other the way we should. I try to pay attention to what is published in Serbia, Bosnia, and Montenegro, but I fail miserably. The borders do not let books go through, so you have a Croatian author who must publish their book in the same language three times—for the Serbian, Bosnian, and Croatian markets, which is ridiculous. We have four versions of Elena Ferrante. Do we really need to publish the same book repeatedly? Wouldn’t it be better if we were to translate and publish different and new voices? That is why I prefer the internet. You find your friends there, you read each other, you comment—it is livelier. The internet is more real nowadays, because it doesn’t try to deny common ground.

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Section Editors’ Highlights: Winter 2019

January 28, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News  |  by Ah-reum Han, Caridad Svich, Ellen Jones, and Joshua Craze

Explore the Winter 2019 issue with our section editors!

Not sure where to start with the brand new Winter 2019 issue of Asymptote? At 35 countries represented, this issue is our most diverse yet, and marks the eighth anniversary of Asymptote. Here, our Section Editors recommend some of their favourite pieces from their respective sections.

The writing of María Sánchez tracks close to the ground; she hunts experience. In “The Next Word,” compellingly translated by Bella Bosworth, we accompany Sánchez in her truck, as she drives around the Spanish countryside, working as a field veterinarian. There is a great slowness to her prose, born of hours of careful observation of people and things. The letters that composed this piece read like prayers, written to an unknown God, in praise of those small moments in which, as Sánchez writes, “life stands still and nothing happens.” There is a delicate empiricism at work here—an empathy with the world and its rhythms that Sánchez reads by looking at her, as if she were the geiger counter of existence. “Sometimes”, she writes, quoting Gabriella Ybarra, “imagining has been the only option I have had to try to understand.”

— Joshua Craze, Nonfiction Editor

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

January 25, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Jonathan Egid, Lara Norgaard, and Nestor Gomez

From doublespeak in São Paulo and migrant caravans in El Salvador to a very British dystopia, catch up on the latest in world literature!

We’re back this week with dispatches from three countries where literature and politics have been interacting in unexpected ways: Brazil, El Salvador, and the UK. In response to the election of Jair Bolsonaro, Central American migration to the US, and the Brexit negotiations, museums and literary communities in these countries have been producing thoughtful exhibitions, fiction, and criticism that reflect on national identity and uncertain political futures. 

Lara Norgaard, Editor-at-Large for Brazil, reporting from Brazil

It is hot and humid in Brazil, and long summer days provide opportunities for new authors and space for reflection about writing as political resistance. Early career authors have an opportunity to submit their work for the SESC Prize for Literature, which is open for submissions from January 9 through February 14, when unpublished authors can submit their manuscripts; the Record Publishing Group will release winning texts.

For Brazilian writers interested in producing their own literature beyond the traditional market, 2019 also offers new opportunities. Graphic artist Rodrigo Okuyama hosts a series of free workshops on zine-making at the Centro Cultural São Paulo. On Saturdays from January 12-26, participants can learn about format, illustration techniques, and how to marry narrative content with visual form. These workshops allow new voices to join a growing independent publishing scene in Brazil, where small collectives like PANTIM work at the intersection of literature and the visual arts. READ MORE…

Blog Editors’ Highlights: Winter 2019

January 21, 2019  |  in News  |  by Chloe Lim, Jonathan Egid, and Nina Perrotta

Our blog editors provide a tasting menu of the literary feast that is Asymptote's Winter 2019 issue

Featuring work from twenty-three languages and a record-breaking thirty-five countries, there’s plenty to choose from in Asymptote’s Winter 2019 issue! Today, our three blog editors share their favorite pieces, from Icelandic, Slovak and Latvian poetry to Brazilian Portuguese social commentary and Bengali short stories.

From the Fiction section, the ever-intensifying “The Meat Market,” translated from the Bengali, takes one unexpected turn after another in a thrilling prose adventure. Set a week before Eid, what should be a celebratory, communal affair quickly turns sour in East Rajabazar. This is a city where transactions are tainted by the potential for danger, just as the meat sold is tainted by false advertising. Aminul Islam faces the full consequences of these circumstances that he fails to fully understand, culminating in a shocking conclusion carefully set up by Mashiul Alam’s artful prose, switching deftly between first- and third-person at crucial moments in the narrative.

If you are looking for exciting poetry freshly translated into English, don’t miss out on Steinn Steinarr’s “Time and Water.” Hailed as Iceland’s greatest modernist poet, Steinarr’s ethereal poetry combines Icelandic poetics with modernist free verse and imagism to create gems like:

And the sorrow I hid
nearly found your own,
like a fjord-blue sea.

In this sequence on a failed and flawed relationship, the distance between the speaker and the other is quite nearly but not quite ever bridged. Equally impressive are the complex rhythms of Monta Kroma’s extract from Lips. You. Lips. Me., a larger collection of experimental modernist poems. The Latvian poet plays on the use of refrains and repetition to create a circular, almost obsessive monologue. These poems are ones that I’ve been returning to, and ones you might love too! READ MORE…

Translation Tuesday: “The Attack of the Living Chairs” by Jonathan Minila

January 15, 2019  |  in Translations  |  by Will Stockton

When I stood up, the chairs arranged themselves menacingly.

This week, we present a darkly funny short story in which an important dinner party is hijacked by a gang of malevolent chairs. Written by Jonathan Minila and translated from the Spanish by Will Stockton, “The Attack of the Living Chairs” is both an absurdist romp and a mocking portrait of Mexico’s ruling class. 

The chairs revealed themselves as soon as we crossed into the dining room. They drew back to the wall and surrounded us as we approached the table.

The women screamed. We did, too. The guest of honor—the President’s wife—swooned and fainted. I served as the home’s proprietor, and something had to be done.

I tried to pick her up, feeling ridiculous, disgusted to touch a woman with so much fat on her arms and such a formidable mustache. Still, everyone hoped I would find a solution.

My wife seemed to have been rendered speechless. The others, too. No one moved. Only me, who struggled to lift this influential fat woman.

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

January 11, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Barbara Halla, Nina Perrotta, and Rachael Pennington

Find the latest in world literature here!

This week, join our wonderful Asymptote staff members, Barbara, Rachael, and Nina, as they bring you literary updates from Albania, Spain, and the United States. From prestigious national literary awards to new and noteworthy titles and translations, there is plenty to discover in this week’s dispatches. 

Barbara Halla, Editor-at-Large for Albania, reporting from Albania:

December was a productive month for Albanian publishers, a natural result of the conclusion of the Tirana Book Fair and the expected increase in book sales that marks the holiday period. On December 18, 2018, the Albanian Ministry of Culture conferred the National Award for Literature for the best books published in 2017. Henrik Spiro Gjoka won the “Best Novel” award for his work Sonatë për gruan e një tjetri (A Sonnet for Another Man’s Wife), which details the life of a psychiatrist who falls in love with one of his patients. Translator Aida Baro won the “Best Translated Novel” award for her rendition into Albanian of Primo Levi’s The Truce (translated into English by Stuart J. Woolf), the continuation of Levi’s autobiography, If This is a Man.

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