Translations

Europe Wrap-Up – #WITMonth

~ Cheryl

This is the final day of the Northern & Western Europe focus for Women in Translation Month, so I’ll try to catch up with lots of people whom I have not yet mentioned.

Starting in Sweden, we have Sara B. Elfgren, co-author of the massively-selling and soon-to-be-movies Engelsfors series. I’ll be talking more about her when we get to the LGBT focus day.

Moving on the Finland, Salla Simukka, is the Next Big Thing in YA fiction. The first book in her Snow White Trilogy, Red as Blood, will be published in English on August 26th.

Also from Finland, Emmi Itäranta now lives in the UK and writes in English, but I don’t want to leave her out just because she’s smart enough to be bilingual. Her Memory of Water is a very interesting dystopian novel set in a future Finland that is ruled by the Chinese. I’m not entirely convinced by her future setting, but the story of a young woman trying to respect a family tradition, while discovering that her parents may have done something horribly unethical, is very well told.

Emmi is featured alongside Jenny Kangasvuo and Tiina Raevaara in the Finnish Weird magazine, paper copies of which doubtless be available at Worldcon. (I have a few if you want to reserve one.)

Talking of people who write in English, I haven’t forgotten Aliette de Bodard (France/Vietnam) and Rochita Loenen-Ruiz (Netherlands/Philippines). I’m saving them for the Asia tour.

Finally we drop in on Spain to say hi to Rosa Montero whose Blade Runner influenced novel, Tears in Rain, is available in translation.

Now I get to worry about who I have forgotten. I’m sure there are lots of them.

M̩lanie Fazi Р#WITMonth

~ Cheryl

Our next stop on the European tour for Women in Translation Month is France. For my French episode of Small Blue Planet I spoke to Mélanie Fazi, who has had short fiction published in translation in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science-Fiction, Black Static and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Mélanie also translates English language works into French. As Brandon Sanderson is one of the people whose books she has translated, she may well be quite busy these days.

Mélanie shares the podcast with Lionel Davoust. They talk about their own work, and that of many other French writers. You can listen to the episode here.

Leena Krohn – #WITMonth

~ Cheryl

It is back to Finland for today’s Women in Translation post. Leena Krohn is one of Finland’s most respected writers. Like Johanna Sinisalo, she was won the Finlandia Prize (Finland’s equivalent of the Booker) and her career dates back to 1970. I remember that when the VanderMeers came to Finncon Jeff was absolutely ecstatic to get to meet her.

I reviewed Tainaron: Mail from Another City for Emerald City #111 back in 2004, and I’m including that review below. However, the book I’d recommend is Datura, of which Ann & Jeff published an English edition fairly recently. It is a very, very strange book about a young woman who gets a job working for a Fortean-style magazine and, at the same time, accidentally becomes addicted to the psychotropic Datura plant. I think you can imagine how weird that gets. Krohn’s descriptions of the various obsessives who frequent the magazine’s offices are an absolute delight.

Tainaron Review

Leena Krohn is a successful mainstream writer from Finland with a long track record of novel publication stretching back to 1970. Like many European writers, having not grown up in an Anglo culture that suffers from an obsessive desire to distinguish between “good” mimetic fiction and “crap” fantastical works, she is comfortable writing weird stuff. Finally we English speakers are able to sample some of her work, and very interesting it is too.

The book we have on offer is Tainaron: Mail from Another City. It is a short book made up of letters sent by an un-named narrator from the fabled City of Insects. It is very odd, and it reminds me of something that Italo Calvino might have written.

Each letter tells of some encounter between the letter writer and some inhabitant of Tainaron. To begin with these are fairly straightforward, if very strange. Thankfully our guide to Tainaron has the benefit of her long-suffering friend, Longhorn Beetle, to put right her foolish, humanocrentic views before she can cause too much offense. As time goes on, however, Tainaron becomes more and more terrifying. The buildings in which the ants live are for the most part merely alien, but the beach of the ant lions are another matter entirely.

I confess that I am at something of a loss to understand what I am supposed to take away from this book. I don’t think that it is supposed to be merely a tale of creeping horror. But neither is the sort of intricate social satire that you can see in Čapek’s play, The Life of the Insects. It isn’t even clear whether we are supposed to view Tainaron as a real place, because our heroine complains constantly that her friend back in the human world never replies to the letters. Possibly Krohn is simply trying to get us to question some of our cultural norms. Or possibly she is simply playing with an interesting idea for creative writing. All I can say for certain is that this doesn’t appear to be in any way the fault of the translation, which reads very smoothly despite the weirdness of the content. Whatever, Tainaron is a fascinating little book and a welcome introduction to a fine writer whose works have thus far been unavailable to anyone who does not read Finnish.

Juli Zeh – #WITMonth

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

The next stop on our European tour is Germany. You probably won’t find Juli Zeh’s books shelved under science fiction, and to be honest Dark Matter is really a book about scientists rather than SF, for all it’s fascination with quantum physics. The Method, on the other hand, is classic near-future dystopianism. They are both fine books, and well worth your attention.

While I’m on the subject, I note that my pals at For Books Sake have done a piece about Ludmilla Petrushevskaya’s magnificent There Once Lived a Woman Who Tried to Kill Her Neighbour’s Baby. That’s a book by a Russian woman that won a World Fantasy Award in 2010 (tied with Gene Wolfe).

Karin Tidbeck – #WITMonth

~ Cheryl

This official prompt for this week on Women in Translation Month is Northern & Western Europe. I am all over this. And I’m starting with another absolute star of the field.

Being a brilliant writer in one language takes skill. Doing the same thing in two different languages is an amazing achievement. It is one thing to be able to speak two languages. Being good enough to write brilliant fiction is quite another. As an example, Zoran Živković is perfectly capable of creating readable translations of his novels for marketing to agents and publishers, but he knows he isn’t good enough with English to do without a professional translator to make the English language versions really sing.

Karin Tidbeck is the sort of quiet genius who can write brilliant fiction in her native Swedish, and then translate it to English so well that she wins awards for the English versions too. She also has one of the weirdest imaginations I have ever come across. Her collection, Jagannath, was by far the best-selling book in the old e-book store when I was running it. You can find my review here. Just in case you don’t already have a copy, check the book out, it is brilliant.

Johanna Sinisalo #WITMonth

~ Cheryl

It shouldn’t have taken much guessing to realize that my post today would be about Johanna Sinisalo. What’s not to like: she’s Finnish, she’s feminist, and she’s a damn good writer. Also she has a mask named after her in Mythago Wood, which is about as unique an honor as you can get. I am lucky enough to have just been sent a review copy of her most recently translated novel: Blood of Angels. I’ll be writing about that once I’ve had time to read it.

In advance of that, you can find a review of her Birdbrain, which Sam Jordison wrote for me at Salon Futura, here. And finally, here’s the review that I wrote of her Tiptree-winning novel, Not Before Sundown (Troll in the USA). The review first appeared in Emerald City #102, with a cover date of February 2004.

Last year’s Eurocon was in Finland. Michael Swanwick was a Guest of Honor and he came back enthusing about a book called Not Before Sundown by Johanna Sinisalo. Entirely separately I had been recommended the book by a Finnish reader. This sounded very promising, and it was.

Of course the book’s reputation should speak for itself. It is Sinisalo’s first novel, but it won the prestigious Finlandia Prize, which is for the best novel of any type in Finnish (and is worth around €26,000). This is a serious accolade, approximately equivalent to China Miéville winning the Booker Prize. Wouldn’t happen in the UK. Sinisalo also manages to win the Atorox Prize, which is for Finnish SF&F, with almost Langfordian regularity. This suggests that she is seriously good, and it suggests correctly.

The plot of Not Before Sundown revolves around a photographer called Mikael who finds an injured animal near his apartment and takes it in to nurse it. The animal is a troll, a rare Finnish species that may or may not be distantly related to the yeti and sasquatch. It is bipedal, but covered in black fur with a short, tufted tail and much thicker hair around the head. It is a predator. The description rather reminded me of Wolverine in The X-Men.

The book has three separate strands to it. The first is exploration of the idea of trolls as a real species: how and why they might have evolved, and what their lifestyle might be. The second trawls through Finnish folklore for information about trolls, which may be simply mythological but may also give answers to the scientific questions (Sinisalo gives an interesting explanation as to why trolls are said to turn to stone in the sun). And finally we have Mikael’s story, in which the obvious physical reality of the troll meshes with its mythological role as a creature of darkness. It doesn’t help that the troll appears to give off powerful pheromones that drive humans sex-crazy.

His troll’s like a shred of night torn from the landscape and smuggled inside. It’s a sliver of tempestuous darkness, a black angel, a nature spirit.

Can you tame darkness?

Perhaps you can if, to start off, it’s very, very young, helpless enough, in bad shape…

One of night’s small cubs.

In amongst this, Sinisalo weaves an interesting story about gay men. This isn’t exactly an area I know much about, but the sex scenes seem far more convincing to me than those in the Slash-influenced Fall of the Kings. Plus there is a very neat side-plot where Mikael’s imprisonment of the wild troll in his apartment is contrasted with the behavior of one of his neighbors who has purchased a Filipina bride. All in all it is a very complex book that packs a lot into under 250 pages. It also has a rather experimental feel to it that reminded me of Angela Carter and Italo Calvino.

So yeah, score one for Finland. This is a really good book that, with its mix of science and mythology and personal relationships, is right in the middle of the current fashion for genre bending. And it is available in English translation, so you have no excuse for not getting hold of it.

Women in Translation Month #WITMonth

~ Cheryl

So, August is Women in Translation Month. Who knew, eh?

Week, I did, because I ran across it on Twitter a few weeks back. It is being run by a book blog called Biblibio, and you can find an introductory post here.

I’m not going to promise to post every day because I’ll be stupidly busy for much of the month. However, this is an issue very close my my heart involving, as it does, the intersection between two marginalized groups: women writers, and non-Anglophone writers. I shall do my best. You may recall that I’m on a translation panel at Eurocon, and am also doing a GoH interview with a lady who happens to be a translator. I’ll also be reminding you of a few of my favorite translated novels and stories over the coming weeks.

Tomorrow the schedule asks people to blog about their favorite translated women writers. Yesterday I got a review copy of the latest English language book by one of mine, which I’ll be reading as part of the project. Can anyone guess what it is?

A History of Arabic SF

~ Cheryl

It is written in Italian, which probably makes it difficult for most of my readers, but there is an English-language interview with the author, Ada Barbaro, over at the Arab Lit blog. We really do need a Europe-wide academic SF conference. I’d love to meet Ms. Barbaro. She is on Twitter.

All of which reminds me that Somewhere!, the sequel to Ibraheem Abbas & Yaser Bahjatt’s novel, HJWN, is now available on Amazon.

A Review for Kontakt

~ Cheryl

Australian critic, Seán Wright, has posted a review of Wizard’s Tower’s anthology of Croatian science fiction & fantasy, Kontakt. It seems that he liked it.

Many thanks to Seán for doing this. Lots of people talk about diversity in SF&F, but nowhere near as many are prepared to back that up by looking at what people in other countries write.

Brief Status Update

~ Cheryl ~ 31 Comments

Well, yesterday went pretty much as I expected. Many thanks to all of those who made kind comments about my post. However, please don’t be misled by the echo chamber effect. What matters is not just who comments, but who does not. It is pretty clear to me that I am mostly getting support from one side in this, and that means I have made a lot of people very angry with me.

As I have a healthy sense of self-preservation, I have cancelled my appearance at Worldcon. I may still be in London at the time, depending on what Kevin is doing, if anyone wants to catch up.

I’d like to take this opportunity to apologize to anyone who is now worried about being tarred by association with me. I certainly won’t take it against anyone who wants to sever their relationship.

The next task is to take stock of my various projects and see what damage has been done. I suspect that the bookstore may be a casualty of this. However, the biggest problem is the Translation Awards. I confess that one of the reasons things have been so slow this year is that I have been afraid to do anything for fear of accidentally provoking a shitstorm. That’s now gone up by an order of magnitude. So if there is anyone out there who thinks that they are worth preserving, please contact me privately.

Meanwhile, day job, which desperately needs attention after the past few days of distraction.

Kontakt In Stores

~ Cheryl

For those of you who prefer to buy your ebooks from piranhas rather than people, copies of Kontakt, our anthology of Croatian SF, are now available from the usual outlets:

And doubtless all of their other stores around the world too. It should also be in B&N and Kobo.

We Have Kontakt

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

KontaktI trailed Kontakt yesterday, and wasn’t expecting to put it out for a day or two. However, circumstances have conspired to allow me to make it available today, so I am doing so. I wrote a preface for this book. Here it is in full.

In April 2012 the European Science Fiction Convention (Eurocon) took place in Zagreb. I was lucky enough to be invited as a guest, and thus made my first ever visit to Croatia. The English-speaking world knows that country perhaps best for the magnificent city of Dubrovnik whose mediaeval fortifications were used for King’s Landing in the Game of Thrones TV series. Worldcon regulars may also remember that Zagreb has occasionally bid to run the convention, though we had not seen much of Croatian fandom. I had little idea of what to expect, and was blown away by the friendliness, enthusiasm and organizational skills of the people that I met.

One of the best things that the convention did was to put together an anthology of Croatian science fiction and fantasy, translated into English, and gave it away free to all attendees. Sadly that amounted to only a few hundred copies. The book did not go on general sale, so the wider world has been unable to witness the talent on display. Despite that, Zoran Vlahović’s story, “Every Time We Say Goodbye” was shortlisted for the 2013 Science Fiction and Fantasy Translation Awards, thereby raising interest in Croatian SF. Thankfully the editors, authors and publishers have allowed me to put together this ebook edition to bring their work to a wider market.

Croatia is an amazing country. The writers whose work you will find in this book have all lived under a Communist government as part of the former Yugoslavia. They have all lived through a War of Independence in the 1990s. In the past Croatia was on the Christian frontier holding back the Ottoman Empire, and was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Like nearby Transylvania, it has a strong tradition of vampire legends. Now it is part of the European Union, and very much looking to the future. All of this informs the fiction you will read here. I’m delighted to be able to bring it to you.

My thanks go to the editors, Darko Macan and Tatjana Jambrišak; to Petra Bulić and her team at SFera who put on the convention and co-published the book; to all of the authors; and to Mihaela Marija Perković and her family who have looked after me so well on my visits to their country.

And here’s the contents list:

  • Introduction by Darko Macan
  • Bloodhound by Milena Benini
  • Hi-Tech Sex Lib by Dalibor Perković
  • Give Me the Shuttle Key! by Tatjana JambriÅ¡ak
  • The Corridor by Darko Macan
  • The Dead by Aleksandar Žiljak
  • River Fairy by Ivana Delač
  • De Cadenza by Danijel Bogdanović
  • Every Time We Say Goodbye by Zoran Vlahović
  • Avaleon and the Black Feather by Katarina Brbora
  • Time Enough, and Space by Goran Konvični
  • Fingers by Danilo Brozović
  • The Executor by Zoran KruÅ¡var

Routes to Diversity – Hiring an Editor

~ Cheryl

There are many different ways in which writers from outside the dominant Anglo-Saxon culture can get their books to the attention of those readers. Different people can make use of different routes. Some, like Nalo Hopkinson, come from English-speaking countries with non-white cultures. Some, like Aliette de Bodard, are raised bilingual. Some, like Karin Tidbeck, learn English well enough to translate their own work while others, like Johanna Sinisalo, are well respected enough to have English-language publishers pay for translation. However, not everyone fits one of these boxes. What do you do if you are from a non-English-speaking country, are not famous enough or rich enough to get translated, but can’t write English well enough to produce a marketable book in that language? That was the dilemma facing Polish author, Justyna Plichta-Jendzio. She managed to find a different solution. I asked her to tell me her story.

I should note that Justyna’s solution may not work for everyone in her position, and good editors may be as thin on the ground as good translators. However, I’m delighted that Justyna found something that worked for her, and I hope that more people in her position will find ways to get their books to the English-reading public in future.

Justyna’s books are published by Devine Destinies, an imprint of the Canadian publisher, eXtasy Books.

CMM: What is being published in English worth to you? Is it a question of numbers? Wikipedia says that there are only 40 million native Polish speakers in the world, while the number of native English speakers is much higher.

JPJ: There are two reasons for which I have chosen the English-speaking market. First, as you have already mentioned, the number of people speaking English. If we sum up only the number of citizens of the USA (320 million in 2012), Canada (35 million), Great Britain (63 million) and Australia (23 million) the number of English-speaking people grows up to nearly 420 million. There are also countries, such as India, in which English is very important and serves as second native language. In Scandinavia most of the young people speak English as well as they do their native languages. English is also the language of business, so most people who want to make international careers know it at least on a medium level. All of this enlarges the English-speaking market exponentially.

Another reason is that in countries like England, Sweden, Norway and many others, there are higher numbers of fantasy fans than in Poland. This probably comes from the fact that, due to historical events, more customs and legends from pre-Christian times survived in those regions than in Poland, and people are more fascinated with them.

CMM: How easy is it for a Polish writer to get translated?

JPJ: Being published by a Polish publisher and then being promoted by this publisher abroad is the easiest way; under the condition that you are published by a big publisher, promoted in your home country, then translated by a professional literary translator, contracted by a foreign publisher and again promoted abroad. But not many writers have such luck. I didn’t.

CMM: What gave you the idea of looking for an English-language publisher who could help you with your English?

JPJ: It was my main goal to get to the English-speaking market, so I thought I would skip the Polish part and start immediately with offering my book Dark Children of Naor directly to American, Canadian and English publishers as if I were an English writer.

CMM: How did you find Devine Destinies, and how long did it take?

JPJ: I searched for a publisher for a year. In the meantime I gained a little information about English publishing markets and the ways I could publish my book. Most of the members of different forums recommended against paid publishing or independent publishing. They advised looking for a publisher at any cost, so I did. The problem was that I translated the book myself with the help of Polish translator. I polished the book the best I could, but it was still a language disaster.

Most of my submissions were rejected due to the horrible language of my translation. However, I had more luck than sense, and after one year of search Devine Destinies accepted my book. They usually published books after 3-6 months, but I waited a year and a half before my book was edited. During the editing process, the editors found my language so inappropriate and full of errors that it tremendously extended how long it took to edit.

It would have lasted even longer, but I decided to help them and find an American editor who could help me and finish editing the last 25% of the book. I had to find a person who already had experience working with foreign writers, understood the specific type of literature that fantasy is, follow my tips and — what was very important to me — would give me a reasonable price for their editing service. I sent dozens of letters to different editors, but their prices were far beyond my possibilities. Finally, I found Daniel Koeker from Manuscript Magic, and that was it. I have cooperated with Daniel so far and do not intend to look for another editor.

Of course, his help sped up my first book’s publishing, and I sent my publisher my second book, Evil Children of Naor, immediately after his edits.

CMM: How much of a collaborative effort is the final book?

JPJ: I think even after edits the book remains mine. Of course, it is thanks to Daniel. I asked him to change only as little as he could, while still adapting the language to the standards of the American market. He was not to change any paragraphs or dialogues, only to care for the correctness of the language. Of course he also had to pay attention to the quality of the language; because the book is high/dark fantasy, Daniel had to erase or change words, expressions and idioms which are too modern and adapt them to the times the book is set in.

After Daniel does his corrections, he sends the book back for my approval so I have a chance to accept or reject the changes or ask him to revise again. At the beginning we had to send my text to and from 3-4 times; now Daniel understands my way of thinking very well and my story is polished after Daniel’s second edit.

I know he does great job because my publisher’s editor, who makes control reads, complimented me for my English language!

CMM: Are you making money from the book?

JPJ: Not yet, but I know Devine Destinies sells some of my books; I receive quarterly statements. Unfortunately sales are too low to give me any profits.

Before my book was published, I was warned not to expect any miracles; not only was I foreign and an unknown author, but also one of hundreds who are published every month. So it was up to me to do the promotion campaign. The publisher invests in edits; if there is necessary — and in cover design. I decided to find an artist myself and provide them my own cover. The publisher also covers the other things necessary to publish the book. But the promotion is on my head. This is how I found you.

Around the World in 80 Stories

~ Cheryl ~ 1 Comment

Here is a delightfully mad project.

A German publisher called Erik Schreiber is looking to put together an anthology of 80 SF stories from writers in 80 different countries. The book will take two forms.

1. A paper version with all of the stories translated into German, which Erik will sell through his publishing company, Saphir im Stahl.

2. An ebook edition of the stories in their original languages, which authors will receive as their payment.

I suspect that there may be some technical difficulties with part 2, if only because having an ebook that mixes Latin alphabets with Chinese, Japanese, Arabic and Russian could be a nightmare. I’ll continue talking to Erik about that. I’m also still checking on the exact contract details. But it does seem an entertaining prospect if people have a story that they are prepared to donate.

Translation is the other issue. Erik apparently already has the resources to translate from English, French and Spanish. If people from countries that don’t use those languages are able to submit in one of them (probably English, I guess) that might help. But equally there are many competent German translators out there (hello Monique!).

For further information, and a list of the authors already signed up, see the project’s website. I note that Erik is cheating slightly in allowing the Republic of California as a separate country, but it used to be one, albeit briefly, and I’m totally on board with that. Maybe Emma Newman can donate a story for Kernow.

If you want to talk to Erik, he does have some English, but I recommend that you talk to my pal Dirk Weger whom I met at Finncon this year and whose English is superb. I’d be happy to put potential authors in touch. And if you have questions, please ask them in comments. Dirk and I will do our best to answer them.

Translation Awards Press Coverage

~ Cheryl ~ 6 Comments

It was good to see the winners of the Translation Awards getting recognized in various community news outlets. My thanks to Locus, Tor.com, and Amazing Stories. What really pleases me, however, is when I see the story being picked up outside of the community. Here are a couple.

The Jewish Book Review featured the honorable mention for Kaytek the Wizard.

A national newspaper in Croatia, Novi List, featured the honorable mention for Zoran Vlahović, including an interview with me. That one is in the print edition as well, and the previous day there was a huge article about Jacqueline Carey. Many thanks to Davor Žic for his fine coverage of Liburnicon.

If anyone knows of any additional coverage, please let me know.

Coode Street, Adventure Rocketship, Translations and Gatekeepers

~ Cheryl

The latest episode of the Coode Street Podcast includes some discussion of political science fiction. Along the way Jonathan makes mention of Adventure Rocketship #1, which he says has some “really strong stories” in it. He singles out Tim Maughan’s story, “Flight Path Estate”, for particular praise. I am a very proud publisher.

Of course, being praised by the Mullahs of Coode Street will ruin Tim’s street cred for all eternity. But I am cruel and heartless, and also I have this new trick of embedding an audio player, so if you want to listen to what Jonathan has to say you can do so here:



Also in the podcast, the boys discuss the short lists for the SF&F Translation Awards. This makes me very happy, and also gives me another opportunity to plug Karin Tidbeck’s wonderful Jagannath. I hope to be recording an episode of Small Blue Planet featuring Karin sometime soon.

Finally the boys discuss how one gets to be an “insider” in the SF&F community. Karen Burnham and I were mentioned specifically by name, and I always try to respond to the Summon Cheryl spell, so I guess I should say something about how it was for me.

I must start by noting that there are all sorts of levels of privilege that facilitated my becoming known by people who might be regarded as gatekeepers (including Gary and Jonathan). I’m white; I come from an English-speaking country; I had a good education, including parents who indulged my reading habit; and I have had sufficient disposable income and work-related travel to allow me to attend many conventions.

On the other hand, I’m also female and trans, which ought to count against me (unless you are one of those people who believe that trans women are “really” men and benefit from male privilege at all times). So how did I get in? Well, I thought to myself, I knew people. Dave Langford and Martin Hoare were friends before I ever went to a Worldcon. I met Kevin at the first Worldcon I attended, and that must have helped.

Then I stopped, because I realized I was telling myself that I only got an in because of who I was sleeping with. And maybe that is true of me, some people certainly think it is, but I refuse to believe that it is true for every woman who makes a name for herself in the community.

(Update: for the benefit of people with over-active imaginations, I should point out that Dave and Martin are just friends. I’m very happy with Kevin and see no need to build up a harem.)

I think it is complicated. And to illustrate that I invite you to consider some of this year’s WSFS business. As many of you will know, someone has decided to propose that we scrap all of the fan Hugos. I’m not going to have a rant about that. Other people have been doing the job for me. What I want to do is note that there are many reasons why people advocate killing the fan categories. They include:

  • That they keep getting won by professionals
  • That they bring the Hugos into disrepute because they result in non-professionals winning awards
  • That they are won by people who are too old
  • That they are won by people who are too young
  • That they are won by the “wrong sort of fan” (i.e., fans of the wrong thing)
  • That they are won by people who are “not part of our community” (i.e., people who might be fans of the right thing, but whom we’ve not heard of before)

What all of these things have in common is that there are people who think that the fan Hugos are being won by people who are, to use the favorite SMOF term, “not worthy”. It is a very common meme, and it doesn’t just get applied to people who win awards. In fandom it tends to get applied by members of one subgroup against any member of another subgroup who achieves success beyond that subgroup.

So yeah, there is plenty of privilege involved. I accept that, and do what I can to make it easier for people who don’t have the advantages I had. But privilege is generally not enough. You do have to be prepared to work at it too.

Finncon – The Russians Have Come

~ Cheryl ~ 6 Comments

With the St. Petersburg Eurocon now being a real thing, Russian fans very sensibly turned up at Finncon to promote the event. They also kindly put on a panel to update us on the state of SF in their country. And boy is there a lot to catch up with. Last year there were 777 new novels published in Russia. Add into that anthologies, collections and reprints, and you have a heck of a lot of books. Never mind one person not being able to read everything eligible for the Hugos; no one in Russia can keep up with all of the SF in Russian.

Of course the quality is not always that great. If you are familiar with the Black Library series of books about the Warhammer universe you’ll have some idea of what the Russians mean by a “literary project”. They have lots of these, the most successful being an ongoing series about a group of meddling time travelers.

Oddly, at the same time, their magazine publishing is declining. The only Russian language short fiction print venue left is Mir Fantastika, which is more like SFX with fiction than like Asimov’s. (Apparently there used to be a Boris Strugatsky’s Magazine, but that has gone out of business.) Weirdly there is still a Russian language SF fiction magazine published in Israel, and possibly one in Germany too. And the Russians are starting to do online magazines, which is good news.

Something else that is on the decline is translation of English language works into Russian. That’s down to piracy, which is a shame, but doesn’t surprise me.

There isn’t much Russian short fiction available in English, but that will change. The St. Petersburg committee are planning to follow the excellent example of Zagreb and produce an anthology of modern Russian SF for Eurocon members. I’m very much looking forward to that. In the meantime I’m hoping to have a Small Blue Planet episode devoted to Russia fairly soon, and my new pal Nikolai (who lives in Estonia and appears to speak more languages that I have heard of) is hoping to write an article for someone about modern Russian SF.

I recorded the panel. It may appear as a podcast at some point if the quality is OK.

Small Blue Planet: Israel

~ Cheryl

I may be in Canada, but Small Blue Planet is in Israel. Thanks to the hard work of our wonderful producer, Karen Burnham, the latest episode is now available to listen to at the Locus website. My guests for May are Gili Bar Hillel and Didi Chanoch. As ever, the conversation is very wide-ranging. We do talk about Lavie Tidhar, and many other interesting Israeli writers. And we talk about the wonderful things you can do in Hebrew that you can’t do in other languages. I hope you enjoy it.

Small Blue Planet: France

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

C’est animé? C’est vivant? Je ne sais pas. La traduction, elle est difficile.

Especially when you are as bad at languages as I am.

Thankfully my guests on Small Blue Planet are very good at English. Many thanks to Mélanie Fazi and Lionel Davoust for their wonderful tour of French science fiction and fantasy. Also thanks as ever to our wonderful producer, Karen Burnham, and to Kevin for being the emergency holographic sound recordist.

Along the way we talk about French conventions, the best award trophy in the world, how the UK came to be a fundamentalist Mormon state, Brian Stableford’s amazing translation work, and some of the best SF&F writers working in French today.

As ever, the podcast is available via the Locus Roundtable.

Bumper Issue of Chinese SF

~ Cheryl

Renditions 77-78Via Jonathan Clements I have discovered that the magazine Renditions, published by the Chinese University of Hong Kong, has produced a bumper issue of Chinese SF in translation. There are stories by Liu Cixin, Han Song, La La, Zhao Haihong, Chi Hui and Xia Jia, amongst others. They look to be all new translations too, in that none of the story titles are familiar to me. Thank goodness we added that rule about picking up stories we missed from the previous year to the translation awards. These can go on next year’s list. It looks like the cost would be US$39.90 airmail or US$33.90 surface mail.