With the arrival of August comes the beginning of Women in Translation Month, dedicated to celebrating, promoting and reading women in translation. Why the need for such a month? Simple: if translated literature is already underrepresented in UK sales and general reading culture, then women in translation are even more disproportionately absent.
A quick check of my library proved this to be alarmingly true of my own reading habits too. Although I have many books written by women and many translated books, these two categories did not cross over as often as one might expect. In fact, I have read more books translated by women than translated books whose original authors were women. Like most people, for me this is not a conscious choice but rather is perhaps reflective of what is out there and what is published and promoted.
This tweet from Rónán Hession underlines just how silenced the voices of foreign women are in UK literary culture. Even bearing in mind that translated literature infamously amounts for little more than 3% of UK sales, that still means that less than a third of translated books are by female writers.
That is why campaigns like #WITMonth are important, for raising the profile of authors that deserve to be championed, for encouraging a more balanced, healthier, reading diet, and for encouraging us contemplate the biases, subconscious or otherwise, in publishing, marketing, bookselling and our own reading. The world has a lot of stories to tell and we can understand it better if we listen to a wide variety of them, from different cultures and backgrounds.
So, my small contribution to #WITMonth is this. I am sharing here five recommendations, five books from four countries. Two remarkable novels that everyone should experience, a work of narrative non-fiction quite unlike anything else I've ever read, a short story anthology featuring six writers, and the novel I'm currently reading from a country I knew next to nothing about previously.
Fever Dream - Samanta Schweblin (translated from the Spanish by Megan McDowell)
This Argentine novella came to me with recommendations and warnings. It is short and intensely, at times painfully, powerful. I read it in the small hours of the morning in Denpasar airport last year, unable to stop despite not having slept. This is a work that compels you to devour it in one urgent, disconcerting sitting. It sucks you in, takes hold of you and spits you out feeling haunted. It deals with obsession, maternal love and psychological trauma. A key theme is, as the original title implies, the distancia de rescate, or rescue distance, between a mother and her child. I am reluctant to say much more than that as this really is a book that needs to be experienced. Read it before the forthcoming Netflix adaptation. Fever Dream was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize and Schweblin's short story collection Mouthful of Birds (also translated by Megan McDowell and published by Oneworld) made this year's longlist. I haven't read the latter but it is definitely on my TBR list.
Bret Easton Ellis and the Other Dogs - Lina Wolff (translated from the Swedish by Frank Perry)
This book is peculiar, literary and brilliant - everything we have come to expect from publisher And Other Stories, to be honest. There are stories within stories, from various perspectives, framed by the narration of young Araceli. Such is the nature of the novel that as more is revealed to us about the central characters, so our opinion of them is constantly challenged. One of the most memorable sections is a short story published by one of the characters in which the stifling atmosphere of a tiny village in the hinterland of Castilla La Mancha is wonderfully evoked. This is a clever, innovative novel that explores many themes, not least that of gender roles; it packs in a lot without being particularly long, losing a sense of interconnectedness or sacrificing depth. The very nature and premise of the book might not become apparent until later on, but it is not at all a case of "sticking with it" as it is all such a pleasure to read. It has a lot to offer and will leave you not so much wanting to tell your friends about it as simply imploring them to read it. This year And Other Stories published Wolff's latest novel The Polyglot Lovers (translated by Saskia Vogel) which I look forward to checking out.
Now and at the Hour of our Death - Susana Moreira Marques (translated from the Portuguese by Julia Sanches)
A fascinating, moving and thoughtfully crafted work that, crucially for such a sensitive subject matter, finds the right tone, neither too sentimental nor too clinical. Susana Moreira Marques, skilfully translated by Julia Sanches, gives us a unique insight into the lives of the terminally ill and those around them, both through the author's musings and the first-person accounts from her subjects, presenting us with something that is at times relatable and always deeply human. Death is not a new literary theme but Moreira Marques' approach might just be. Attentive, tender, yet realist, this enriching book is highly recommendable and I'm delighted it was part of my And Other Stories subscription as it's perhaps not something I'd have instinctively reached for otherwise.
Take Six - Six Portuguese Women Writers - edited by Margaret Jull Costa
What better way to enjoy #WITMonth than with a six-in-one collection? These short stories, published by Dedalus, come from esteemed Portuguese writers Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen, Agustina Bessa-Luís, Maria Judite de Carvalho, Hélia Correia, Teolinda Gersão and Lídia Jorge. Brought together by the inimitable Margaret Jull Costa, these tales will remind you how wonderful the short story can be as a form when executed so expertly. So far I have particularly enjoyed the stories by Agustina Bessa-Luís, who sadly passed away last month, in translation by Margaret Jull Costa and Victor Meadowcroft.
Celestial Bodies - Jokha al-Harthi (translated from the Arabic by Marilyn Booth)
This is my current read for #WITMonth. From Oman and brought to the Anglophone world by Scottish publisher Sandstone Press, it won the 2019 MBI Prize. I have not quite finished it yet so I cannot give any definitive opinion but what I will say is that it has been a real eye-opener and absolutely fascinating to read something from a country and culture about which I knew almost nothing. For that reason alone I would already recommend it. That aside, it is also beautifully written and has much to tell about the role of women in Omani society and the country's progression from slave-owning times to the modern day.
Have you read any of these books? What are you reading for #WITMonth? Do you have any recommendations?