Keeping Translations Alive

[DWM]

The following is mainly related to translations of poetry, though some of it may also be applicable to certain kinds of translated fiction. For some time now – at least during the past decade – I’ve become aware that trying to sell poetry in the form of printed books is increasingly an uphill struggle, and some alternative means of reaching a readership may need to be found.

The struggle has always has been there – for example, when I worked at the UK’s Anvil Press Poetry during the 1980s the firm produced no more than 12-14 titles a year,approcimately half of which were translations, and the notion of making a profit was out of the question. Like Bloodaxe, Carcanet and several other specialist publishers, Anvil survived mainly because of the Arts Council grant it received each year, which accounted for most of its income. In the second part of the 1980s and into the 90s, Bloodaxe Books, under its committed director Neil Astley, took a more aggressive approach to poetry publishing, endeavouring to embrace a wider audience and reach out to readers who didn’t normally read poetry at all. This project had some success – although still heavily AC-funded, Bloodaxe did manage to operate as a normal business, comparable to mainstream London publishers of fiction. Bloodaxe’s poetry translation list was (and still is) impressive, including a wide range of titles and poets. But the new vigour didn’t last – by the 2000s, one was again uneasily aware that the Bloodaxe operation was under something of a strain, and in the early part of the decade many Bloodaxe authors and translators were informed that the unsold copies of their back titles would either be sold to them at a discount, or pulped.

The situation with other poetry publishers was not much better, or even worse. Carcanet, which in addition to original poetry and translations also published fiction, seems to have got by on the strength of its fiction list. The smaller houses like Arc and Dedalus were also in trouble, and in 2008 Dedalus had its Arts Council funding cut drastically. After a long campaign, that funding was restored in July last year, but in the present economic climate the future still remains uncertain. Book publishing is currently undergoing a crisis, and because of their minority appeal published poetry and poetry translation are the the first to be seriously affected.

So what’s to be done? My own feeling is that with the increasing power and presence of the Internet, poetry translators, poetry editors and poets should start to take matters into their own hands. Online and ebook publishing may not be to everyone’s taste – I know that Eric heartily dislikes it – but at least it’s a way of sending the work out into the world, and can even be a commercially viable method of sale and distribution. I’ve already started to scan and put online the contents of some of my older Bloodaxe titles – the copyright in those translations rests with me, and the volumes in which they appeared are now of out of print.

Nordic Voices in Print (http://nordicvoices.xtreemhost.com) is my first attempt in this direction – it’s only a basic blog, and is devoted exclusively to the reprinting of my translations of Nordic literature and poetry, but in time I hope to develop the project further and extend it into the area of ebook publishing. Above all I think it’s important to avoid the ghettoization of translated literature that’s evident in certain US-based publishing concerns (they shall be nameless) which enjoy a high profile in the translation world at present. While they may once have been inspired by selfless motives, I believe that those publishers are really taking advantage of the ever-growing marginalization of translated work. Poets and translators beware.

[Eric]

My problem with a great deal of bloggery and online publishing is that it ultimately boils down to a brand of vanity publishing. Because no one else is involved, you can churn out translations and reviews till the cows comes home - but no one will necessarily read them. If online publishing is to become part of a community, it must be linked into print publishing, the newspaper review sections, "non-line" bookselling and so on, and not remain a masochistic lone voice crying in the cyber-wilderness.

Poetry is already a minority genre, even when we consider English-language poetry in Britain. Translated poetry therefore become the a minority within a minority. It is the whole climate of reading that has to be changed. Otherwise you are simply publishing cyber-pearls before cyber-swine. Online publishing gives everyone the chance to show off and boast, but not to any particular community or audience. Literature on the internet is a very fragmented pursuit. There is no guaranteed band of the faithful.

I approve of POD books (print-on-demand). But again these should be printed and sent by, or collected from, bookshops, where you can enter and browse in a physical space where you may be able to look at a copy first. The Achilles heel of all online bookselling is that the reader will want to have at least flicked through books, especially by unknown authors, before buying. Amazon and its peers does not allow for browsing, flicking through and comparing books on a book-table or shelf. (They select the pages you can read online for nothing.) Amazon is, however, great if you've read an online review and know the author already. But online bookshops cannot cater for those who like serendipity finds.

I am not unhappy about the fact that the Arts Council of England (ACE) will have to make cuts and sack bureaucrats. This may sober them up and let them realise, for instance, how cheap translated novels and poetry are compared with the huge vanity projects such as Damien Hirst's skull (would it were his own...) and Tracey Emin's bed, plus huge installations at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, and so on, and opera with its expensive sets and snob value. Let them throw out a few of the over-paid and -hyped celebrities and office workers and concentrate on the small and worthy writings of Europe, small-scale art, local orchestras and quartets, etc.

Thanks to the signatures of some 2,000 people and the generosity of Routledge and, latterly, some Swiss fund, Dedalus has managed to survive. And has been re-instated by ACE. Where there's a will, there a way.

And the Americans are showing more of an enterpising spirit regarding translations. American PEN has several translation people, medium and small publishing houses such as Dalkey, Northwestern, Open Letter Books, Action Books, and so on are beginning to make inroads and reduce that 3% figure that we keep hearing about. Open Letter Books has even published books by a Lithuanian, an Afrikaner, and so on, not only the usual suspects (i.e. Latin American literature, as it is, after all, next door to the States).

So I believe in joined up thinking, not only websites and blogs that run the risk that no one finds them or reads them.

[DWM]

The situation is different with work that has already been published - and significantly, also reviewed - but is now out of print. That can't, in my view, be classed as "vanity publishing".

Nordic Voices In Print (http://nordicvoices.xtreemhost.com) is bringing back into print some titles and parts of poetry translation titles that are currently out of print. It's also a temporary expedient - in time, I aim to produce ebooks, which will offer a more permanent home for this material. Visitors to the blog are already arriving, as the stats clearly indicate. I don't for one moment suppose that this solution will replace the functions of a fully-fledged publisher - but it's a start. The blog is doing its bit to wake up traditional poetry publishers, who are in general complacent and high-handed, and have fallen behind their readers.

For too long the "physical space" of bookshops has been held sacrosanct - it is now abused, largely by the bookshops themselves but also by the publishers, and this needs and deserves to be challenged. An attempt to do so is better than no attempt at all.

[Eric]

You're right about the internet being an opportunity to bring out-of-print works to some forum where they can be read. But I would much prefer to read your translations of, for instance, Gösta Ågren, I poet I admire, in book form. So if you were to also post POD copies to willing readers, this may help bring about a interesting change. But that is, admittedly, a lot of work and investment for one person to handle.

I feel such websites could be fruitful for many other people. If I have understood correctly, the only things being tackled on Nordic Voices in Print are works translated by DWM himself. It is a start, but cooperation with others would be an interesting venture.

Here in Sweden, despite the climate not being very different to that of the UK regarding monopoly and exclusion, there are many small publishers producing worthwhile literary items. I think that an editor is always a handy person to have, so that there is some editorial process involved. But obviously, if you want to launch your own translations only, you don't need an editor. One venture here in Sweden, for instance, has started publishing a series of shortish Czech novels and stoires in translation. Another has a whole range of anthologies of stories from different countries, ranging from Latvia to Egypt. The Swedish small book publishers have several outlets throughout the country, bookshops that take serious literature seriously.

As I said, the community aspect of the physical space of the small bookshop is part of the fun and enjoyment. You can order books by post and buy them in large "factory-style" bookshops, but it's not the same. There is an excellent little bookshop on the Stockholm island of Södermalm, just south of the Old Town, called Söderbokhandeln. Here they play classical music over loudspeakers and generally create an ambience. And they stock all the latest from a whole range of small publishers. That is my ideal. Somewhere where the staff are knowledgeable and know you, at least by sight and previous purchase.

[DWM]

So if you were to also post POD copies to willing readers

I'm afraid not, Eric - sorry. But a nice Kindle (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kindle-Store/b?ie=UTF8&node=341677031) would help.


If I have understood correctly, the only things being tackled on Nordic Voices in Print are works translated by DWM himself.

You're welcome - I already offered you space for your translations in this post (http://www.worldliteratureforum.com/forum/showthread.php/2019-Finland-Swedish-Literature?p=79881#post79881), to which you replied. Others are also welcome to send translations of Nordic lit. You can find my email address in my Blogger profile (http://www.blogger.com/profile/01515361544462041148).


It is a start, but cooperation with others would be an interesting venture.

Here in Sweden, despite the climate not being very different to that of the UK regarding monopoly and exclusion, there are many small publishers producing worthwhile literary items. I think that an editor is always a handy person to have, so that there is some editorial process involved. But obviously, if you want to launch your own translations only, you don't need an editor. One venture here in Sweden, for instance, has started publishing a series of shortish Czech novels and stoires in translation. Another has a whole range of anthologies of stories from different countries, ranging from Latvia to Egypt. The Swedish small book publishers have several outlets throughout the country, bookshops that take serious literature seriously.

As I said, the community aspect of the physical space of the small bookshop is part of the fun and enjoyment. You can order books by post and buy them in large "factory-style" bookshops, but it's not the same. There is an excellent little bookshop on the Stockholm island of Södermalm, just south of the Old Town, called Söderbokhandeln. Here they play classical music over loudspeakers and generally create an ambience. And they stock all the latest from a whole range of small publishers. That is my ideal. Somewhere where the staff are knowledgeable and know you, at least by sight and previous purchase.[/QUOTE]

[DWM]

Like I said before (http://www.worldliteratureforum.com/forum/showthread.php/2019-Finland-Swedish-Literature?p=79881#post79881), Eric, you're welcome to send material for the new blog if there's something you'd like to have published there.

We obviously don't agree about the way in which these texts should be distributed. I am firmly in favour of e-texts, as they can be read on the Kindle, Nook, etc., and for me that way of reading - I recently acquired my second Kindle - has now almost come to replace the conventional printed book. On the other hand, I can appreciate that others, like yourself, prefer the printed format. But to produce print-on-demand volumes on my own and to use the expensive and unreliable U.K. postal service to distribute them would be far beyond the resources I possess at present, or am likely to possess in the foreseeable future.

So the e-text, e-book option seems like the most probable one for this Nordic literature project, if it ever takes root. But for the present, I'm concentrating on the blog, focusing on the content rather than the form.

My earlier post about this doesn't seem to have made it through the moderation system yet.

[Mary LA]

Hi DWN, I like the website and will follow what you're doing. The blog layout is still very generic and you might want to insert images of writers and link to likeminded sites in order to increase your traffic. I use Wordpress and it is quite flexible in terms of design options.

[DWM]

Hi Mary LA,

Yes, the layout is still very generic, and I haven't yet decided how I want to develop the project - whether to keep it on wordpress.com or to continue with the self-hosting option. At present it exists on both:

http://nordicvoicesinprint.wordpress.com

and

http://nordicvoices.xtreemhost.com

and the traffic to the wordpress.com version is quite a lot busier than the traffic to the self-hosted one.

I'm also still looking into the design possibilities, use of photos, etc. - for the present, my main priority is simply to provide a home for the newly-scanned texts, and to make them available to others, partly advertising them via my other Nordic literature blog, which has been running for a couple of years now:

http://nordicvoices.blogspot.com

Thanks for your feedback.

DWM