Tove Jansson turns 101 this Sunday. She was 61 exactly when I was born, so I will be celebrating at a secret location on the day, hence the advance nature of this post. What is there to celebrate this year? For…
We need diverse books has one of the best summer reading campaigns around. Every day they’ll offer you and the children and young people you know a new perspective on a favourite story to expand your world. The campaign links to sources…
Jenny Erpenbeck’s The End of Days, translated by Susan Bernofsky, has variously been described as brutal, haunting, and dreamlike, unvarnished and the work of a miniaturist. It’s all that and more. And it’s a very fitting first German winner of…
“To write a novel (or indeed a short story) you need two ideas – equally strong, equally developed – and only later it turns out that they were one idea after all, two pillars of one foundation.” “Żeby napisać powieść…
It’s European Literature Night tonight, and this whole week the British Academy in London is celebrating fairy tales. This lunchtime Jack Zipes, who translates fairy tales in German, Italian and English, will be talking at the British Academy about his The…
A thing of beauty was released into the world today. It was already there, but now more people can read it. The first five volumes of the Murty Classical Library of Indian literature are now published: 2 millennia of culture…
Maresi, Chronicles of the Red Monastery, was the book I read by the Christmas tree this year; next year you could be doing the same. The splendid Pushkin Press has just bought the English rights. The author, the Swedish Finn…
We always need more children’s books to delight the eye and the ear, in as many languages as possible. The Polish Dwie Siostry (two sisters) Publishing is awarding 2,500 euro to the best new one to add to their catalogue:…