Posts featuring Flavia Teoc

Weekly Dispatches From the Frontlines of World Literature

October 20, 2023  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Eva Wissting, MARGENTO, and Zohra Salih

The latest in literary news from India, Sweden, Spain, and Denmark.

This week, our editors bring news of commendations, intercultural exchanges, and champions of free speech that highlight the need for bold voices and acts of solidarity. 

Zohra Salih, Editor-at-Large, reporting from India

Winter is here—not just in the air outside, but within our hearts. One finds it hard to write about literature and culture with genuine excitement in times like these, when Gaza, already deeply wounded, is bleeding again with little hope in sight. It feels anachronistic to mention the many literary festivals and prizes that are scheduled for this winter, as if one is inhabiting two distinct worlds: one with cause for celebration, another for mourning. At the very least, it seems right to acknowledge this disparity, and to consider the very real responsibility of all literary enthusiasts in bridging this divide, in keeping our eyes and ears open, and in being willing to allow for other truths and realities to be translated as part of our own.

On that note, the JCB Prize for Literature has announced its longlist for 2023, featuring four works in translation. Simsim by Geet Chaturvedi, translated by Anita Gopalan, and I Named My Sister Silence by Manoj Rupda, translated by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar (who was himself longlisted for the prize previously), are both written originally in Hindi; The Nemesis, Manoranjan Byapari’s latest work, is translated from Bengali by V Ramaswamy, and it is also worth noting that this is the third time that the fiery writer has been featured on the longlist.

Perumal Murugan’s Fire Bird is also on the longlist, and was translated from the original Tamil into English by Janani Kannan. A professor of Tamil literature, Murugan’s works have garnered critical acclaim through translations, including Madhorubhagan (One Part Woman), his best-known work, which won the prestigious ILF Samanvay Bhasha Samman in 2015, and caused massive uproar amidst conservatives because of its bold and feminist themes—leading to the author briefly declaring that he was ‘dead’ and retired from writing until the Madras high court judgment unequivocally upheld his artistic freedom. Murugan’s profound and incisive explorations of caste and its entanglement in every rubric of Indian society have also rightly led to his book, Pyre, being longlisted for the International Booker Prize this year, as well as his receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award at the seventh edition of the Ooty Literary Festival, which wrapped up this October. READ MORE…

Weekly Updates from the Front Lines of World Literature

September 4, 2020  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Charlie Ng, David Boyd, MARGENTO, and MK Harb

This week's latest news from Lebanon, Japan, Romania, and Hong Kong!

Our writers bring you the latest literary news this week from Lebanon, where writers have been responding in the aftermath of the devastating port explosion. In Japan, literary journals have published essays centred upon literature and illness, responding to the ongoing pandemic. Romanian literature has been thriving in European literary initiatives and in Hong Kong, faced with a third wave of COVID-19, the city’s open mic nights and reading series have been taking place online. Read on to find out more! 

MK Harb, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Lebanon

This week, as French President, Emmanuel Macron, began his Lebanon tour by meeting the iconic Lebanese diva, Fairuz, the literary world continued to grieve for Beirut in the aftermath of the explosion. Author Nasri Atallah, writing for GQ Magazine, recounts the cataclysmic impact of “Beirut’s Broken Heart.” Writer and translator Lina Mounzer and writer, Mirene Arsanios, exchanged a series of letters to each other for Lithub, talking about the anguish of distance and the pain of witnessing tragedy.Writer Reem Joudi also wrote an intimate essay exclusively for Asymptote, reflecting on her experience of the explosion and the uncertain future that Beirut now faces. Naji Bakhti, a young Lebanese writer, made his literary debut with Between Beirut and the Moon. Published on August 27 with Influx Press, the book is a sardonic coming of age story in post-civil-war Beirut (1975-1990). While Bakhti was chronicling the past, reading it now feels eerily relevant.

In translation news, writer and transgender activist, Veronica Esposito, interviewed Yasmine Seale about her upcoming translation of the Thousand and One Nights. Seale, whose English translation of Aladdin is beautiful in the most transgressive sense, will be the first woman to translate the Thousand and One Nights into English. In the interview, she discusses the colonial and class legacy of translating classics and the wild possibility of re-translating and re-imagining many Arabic classics. Lastly, here at Asymptote, we are excited about acclaimed Egyptian author, Mansoura Ez-Eldin’s new novel, Basateen Al-Basra from Dar El-Shourouk publishing house. Her previous novel, Beyond Paradise, was shortlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction in 2010. We eagerly await its translation from Arabic!

David Boyd, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Japan

This month, Japan’s major literary journals continue to showcase writing that deals with illness. The September issue of Subaru features several essays on the intersection between literature and illness, including “Masuku no sekai wo ikiru” (Living in the World of the Masque), in which Ujitaka Ito connects Sayaka Murata’s Convenience Store Woman to the current pandemic. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches from the Front Lines of World Literature

October 4, 2019  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Jacqueline Leung, MARGENTO, and Quyen Nguyen

Catch up on this week’s latest news in Hong Kong, Vietnam, and Romanian authors around the world.

This week, our reporters tell us about the literary response to the demonstrations in Hong Kong and the translation of protest poetry by The Bauhinia Project, book fairs in Vietnam, as well as guiding us through the many Romanian writers performing at the largest Central European literary festival, the Author’s Reading Month festival. 

Jacqueline Leung, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

The extradition bill demonstrations in Hong Kong have been ongoing for four months and show no signs of stopping. There has been countless speculation over the city’s standing as a financial and trading center, but what has happened for certain is the plethora of art created in response to the movement. In an interview on the subject of contemporary art, a museum curator placed her bets: “The greatest art is going to be produced in Hong Kong.”

The same could be said for its literature. Since June, Hong Kong’s literary scene has actively documented current happenings through poetry, fiction, and criticism. Numerous local literary magazines, including Fleur des lettres, Voice & Verse, and Formless, are running issues dedicated to the protests, and the activity is not restricted to within the city’s borders. In particular, there is an initiative to translate protest poetry from Hong Kong for an international audience. In July, The Bauhinia Project was launched by an anonymous Hong Kong poet in Berkeley, California. Named after the city’s flower emblem, the project gathers poetry submissions and testimonials in text or audio from anonymous sources. The submissions are then translated into English and made into postcards. So far, the postcards have been displayed in a series of exhibitions held in Germany as well as different cities in California. The Bauhinia Project is also curating events on the extradition bill movement. On September 25, a panel discussion on misinformation and misunderstanding surrounding the protests abroad were held at Moe’s Books in San Francisco and featured six speakers, among them Hong Kong poet Wawa, previously interviewed on Asymptote on her medium-pure poetry, and writer Henry Wei Leung.

I will also moderate a discussion on civil society and literature between writer Hon Lai Chu, who spoke about politics and literature at the Frankfurt Book Fair earlier this year, and playwright Yan Pat To, whose latest play, Happily Ever After Nuclear Explosion, premiered in German at Munich’s Residenz Theater and subsequently in Cantonese at Tai Kwun, an arts and heritage site in Hong Kong, and South Korea’s Asia Playwright Festival. The event is part of Goethe-Institut Hong Kong’s wider series on civil society and art, which previously covered independent films, LGBT, and moving images. READ MORE…

Translation Tuesday: “Constantinople” by Flavia Teoc

July 31, 2018  |  in Translations  |  by MARGENTO

More fragrant are the grapes slowly growing sour on a vendor stall in Yerebatan

We are thrilled to feature Flavia Teoc’s poetry for the first time on Translation Tuesday. Teoc’s lines visit Yerebatan—the magical site in Istanbul where the Basilica Cistern hides a special sighting of Medusa. Under the dim lights of Yerebatan, Teoc’s fragrant lines shine brighter. 

Constantinople

More fragrant than the righteous ones perfect in all of their ways
Are the grapes slowly growing sour on a vendor stall in Yerebatan.
Under their cracked skin a sweet potion of sounds is distilled,
Memories from back when they were early sour berries or less,
An equal proportion mixture of screams from a woman flogged
Up against their vine, the bell of a leper who took shelter in the split leaves’
Shadow one late afternoon, and a stray dog’s quick nap nearby.
I’m telling you—
More fragrant are the grapes slowly growing sour on a vendor stall in Yerebatan,
For those perfect in all their ways will never touch them.

READ MORE…