Category Archives: Literary traslation 2014
Dereta publishing house: (In)Tolerance – Seven Awarded European Writers
(In)Tolerance – Seven Awarded European Writers is Dereta’s publishing project, which involved seven awarded authors from six EU countries. We have acquired rights and we will translate these texts, disseminate and promote the selected books in the best possible way.There are several cross points that connect them, otherwise, very different authors, and the central one is the question of (in)tolerance in contemporary society on various levels: social, political, personal. It is the basic question of how we see others: our enemies, friends, family, strangers, lovers, and how we tolerate those who are different than we are. All those novels are very communicative, understandable for broad audience, but also they deal with very important existential questions which are common for most people, regardless their nationality or religion. At the same time, there is no better way to promote European literature and values in Serbia. Raquel Martinez-Gomez Sombras de unicornio and Viktor Horvat Török tükör both won EU Prize for Literature. Ada Murolo, with her novel Il mare de Palizzi, was awarded Rhegium Julii – Sezione Opera Prima prize for 2013, as well as Il Mulinello – special prize of the jury. Patrik Ouředník, with his internationally successful novel Ad Acta, is the most translated Czech writer in the last 25 years. He was awarded the Czech Literary Fund Award. Emil Hakl (1958) is widely recognized as one of the most remarkable writers of Czech literature and is often compared to the great Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal. He was awarded the prestigious Magnesia Litera Prize for O rodičích a dětech. Jonathans Trigell’s novel Boy A won the Waverton Award of 2004, later that year John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and Italian Edoardo Kihlgren Prize. Also, he achived big commercial success which is crowned by a movie adaptation. Franncisco José Viegas is winner of the Portuguese Writers’ Association’s Grand Prize in 2005 with his novel Longe de Manaus.
Odiseja publishing company, Belgrade
Awarded European Children’s and YA Authors
Odiseja will translate, publish and promote 10 proposed children’s books written by 10 awarded authors from 7 EU countries. Proposed novels were written by outstanding, awarded authors: from already classic ones such as Italian Bianca Pitzorno and Czech Pavel Šrout (both shortlisted for Hans Andersen Medal), to younger writers hastily completing their prestigious awards collections, such as Carnegie Medal winner Sally Gardner and Marcus Sedgwick; from worldwide famous bestselling English Jacqueline Wilson, who won all the major awards for children’s literature, to young Hungarian István Lakatos who has yet to cross national borders; from one of the most popular writer of YA fiction, Malcolm Rose, to three mega-stars awarded for both their adults fiction and children’s literature, such as French Daniel Pennac, Norwegian Jo Nesbø and Irish Roddy Doyle. This selection makes a representative sample of the best children’s and YA literature EU has to offer at this moment.
Books: Bianca Pitzorno, La bambinaia francese (The French Governess); Jacqueline Wilson, The Worry Website; Pavel Šrut, Lichožrouti; Roddy Doyle, A Greyhound of a Girl; Daniel Pennac, Kamo. L’agence Babel; Sally Gardner,I Corriander; Jo Nesbø, Doktor Proktors Prompepulver (Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder); Marcus Sedgwick, Midwinterblood; Malcolm Rose, Framed! (Traces series); István Lakatos, Dobozváros (Boxville).
Clio publishing company: Grail on water
The Project Grail on water is a result of a particular editorial concept which has been maintaining in Clio for 23 years. The idea of the concept is to respond to the cultural needs of our environment and to show a variety of literary poetics from the whole world. Grail is a book collection based on translations of novels from literary fields that are not well known in Serbia, and on the contrary, very much appreciated in their countries. The stories take place in the modern time, reflecting the atmosphere in which they are created, introducing readers with the diversity of cultural identities. Thus, we consider the four books chosen for this year’s project an inspiration to writers as well as a challenge to the most experienced translators. The authors are from Netherlands, Greece, France and Italy and each one of them describes everyday life stories about ordinary people, but besides that we can also feel the atmosphere of the specific environment and dramatic social and cultural changes, and their effect on lives of ordinary people.
These literary works tell us about current problems of different societies which are becoming general in all European countries. Serbian readers will, thus, get to know new writers and their literary poetics, as well as new European identity and compare it with its own experience.
Books: Un jour je m’en irai sans en avoir tout dit, Jean d’Ormesson; Figli dello stesso padre, Romana Petri; Rootless, Lefteris Koulierakis; De helaasheid der dingen, Dimitri Verhulst
These literary works tell us about current problems of different societies which are becoming general in all European countries. Serbian readers will, thus, get to know new writers and their literary poetics, as well as new European identity and compare it with its own experience.
Sezam book publishing company, Beograd
Many stories of history
With this year project for a grant Many stories of history, Sezam Book would like to continue the new subject category of our publishing program – the European contemporary literature – that we started last year with the project for EACEA – Read in European.
For this year’s project, Sezam Book was inspired by the quote of Pavol Rankov, about the motives to write his book that is included in our project: “I have the feeling that the little stories, the stories of real people, are closer to reality and truth than the big historical events. History is overburdened with ideology, patriotism and things like that, while the stories – the oral history – of ordinary people are closer to reality and truth.”
Not all of the seven books treat precisely the theme of history swirls and how the ordinary people can face them, survive and recuperate, but all of them show us the different possibilities of coping with the reality that sometimes is too cruel and too strange to be understood. And all of them are the messengers of humanity, reminders of the importance of the universal human values. That kind of message we would like to serve to our readers as the bridge for ideas and interpretations between cultures. For the implementation of this project, Sezam book intends to cooperate with foreign cultural centers and city libraries for the book promotions and first book readings, but also with the Faculty of Philology and Philosophy, inviting students and scholars to participate in the lectures and promotional activities. Sezam book also intends to invite György Spiró for the first public reading of his books, and Pavol Rankov as a special guest during the Belgrade Book Fair in October 2015. In order to enhance the accessibility to translated works and our project, we included the e-books in our publishing program for the first time. All of Sezam book`s promotional activities related to the project will be visible on the web site and the You tube channel.
