Portuguese translation(s) & publishing

[Leseratte]

The Thibaults is a book which is very special for me! ?
I was reading this monumental book when my daddy was on his deathbed 5 months ago and it gave to me forces to face that difficult situation.
I was reading the brilliant volume called La Mort Du Père or "The Father's Death" when my daddy was suffering a lot of pain with kidneys' failure (the same cause of death of Monsieur Thibault in the novel).
Jacques, the imature, knew to face the problem with serenity albeit your methodic brother didn't know (he faced the problem with serendipity - a bad pun, I admite it - with doses of sarcasm and false coldness).
Jacques gave to me forces and humanity to face my father's death. It was a comfort and a relief!

I love this one so much because contains in its plot a "faustian pact" (a dreamer/free young boy with existencial/desilutional struggles in some conflicts with a methodic brother and an austere father), notions about existencialism and absurdism (before Camus and Sartre), an interrupted bildungsroman (as Jacques Thibault was maturing, his brother tries to interrumpt his saga), a hybrid realism/romantism in a historic overview (Mussolini being described in 1914's International as a moderate socialist is very funny - LOL) and another characteristics.

The brazilian preface has a briliant commentary by Moacir Japiassu (journalist, children's book writer and essayist): "[this book] isn't recommended for young people because [we] have no maturity and we are equal to Jacques Thibault, therefore we will have special feelings for him".

Camus said that this one didn't age well and sounds mushy in diverse moments, but it contains doses of psychogogical/humanity analysis in another parts, therefore it's a book which ought to read by every young person (trivia: when Du Gard won the Nobel Prize, he was very criticized by another french writers).

My impressions? I have passional ones, because it was the book which I read when my daddy passed away, but, in general, it's a very unknow and underrated novel

PS: The brazilian translation is very funny because has a lot of regional slangs from Rio Grande do Sul. LOL!

Something about the history of the Brazilian editions of the books by the Gard. The editor was O Globo, probably the greatest editor from Rio Grande do Sul. The translator was certainly from the south too, so nothing strange about consecrated French characters strutting around and saying "Che, Barbaridade"! At that time I guess, one wasn´t so particular about it, specially not the gaúchos, who love their idioms. But because of this particularity it is a historical edition you have there.
Here is a link about the O Globo editions of Roger Martin de Gard´s books. Sadly it is in Portuguese.
:https://www.fbpf.org.br/cd2/liste_des_auteurs/b/nilda_aparecida_barbosa.pdf

 

[Benny Profane]

Something about the history of the Brazilian editions of the books by the Gard. The editor was O Globo, probably the greatest editor from Rio Grande do Sul. The translator was certainly from the south too, so nothing strange about consecrated French characters strutting around and saying "Che, Barbaridade"! At that time I guess, one wasn´t so particular about it, specially not the gaúchos, who love their idioms. But because of this particularity it is a historical edition you have there.
Here is a link about the O Globo editions of Roger Martin de Gard´s books. Sadly it is in Portuguese.
:https://www.fbpf.org.br/cd2/liste_des_auteurs/b/nilda_aparecida_barbosa.pdf

The legendary Editora Globo which published the first edition of In Search of Lost Time, The Thibaults, Jean-Christophe, The Buddenbrooks, The Forsythe Saga, The Magic Mountain and many others heavy books.
House of Hebert Caro (a jew who leaved Germany in Nazi period), Manuel Bandeira, Mário Quintana, Carlos Drummond de Andrade, José Geraldo Vieira, Rachel de Queiroz, Érico Veríssimo and many others.

It's funny to read Monsieur Thibault attempting dar relhadas (to spank) Jacques Thibault and very funny too to read Jacques talking que barbada (it's easy in approximated translation), bah (wow!), bergamota (tangerina in Portuguese or tangerine in English), lancheria (lanchonete in Portuguese or cafeteria in English), chavear a porta (trancar a porta in Portuguese or to lock the door in English) and another gauchesque slangs. LOL!

 

[Leseratte]

Bah, vivente, que é trilegal! (Wow, cherished human, isn´t that wonderful?!)

 

[Benny Profane]

Bah, vivente, que é trilegal!

Bah, que chinelagem, tchê! ?
[English]: wow, it's a bad thing, bro!

 

[Leseratte]

Bah, tu ta se arriando de mim! ( Wow, are you kidding me!?)

 

[Corswandt]

The legendary Editora Globo [...] House of Herbert Caro (a jew who leaved Germany in Nazi period)

The translator of the edition of Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain that I read (and own), from the appropriately named (and recently revived as an imprint) "Editora Livros do Brasil".

 

[Benny Profane]

The translator of the edition of Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain that I read (and own), from the appropriately named (and recently revived as an imprint) "Editora Livros do Brasil".

Wow, I didn't know that The Magic Mountain was published in Portugal under a brazilian translation.
Livros do Brasil was a legendary Publisher House such as Edições Europa-América, Almedina, Relógio D'Água, Editorial Presença and Edições 70 were too.

Mr. Caro translated into portuguese most of the Mann's books.
He is very known for having translated Max Frisch, Hermann Hesse, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig, Bertolt Brecht (some plays), Hermann Broch, Elias Canetti, Vicki Baum and many other germanic writers into portuguese.
Unfortunately, he never translated yiddish literature into Portuguese. Sad!

Another very known brazilian translator is Professor Irene Aron. She is still alive, but she is an elder.

 

[Leseratte]

Wow, I didn't know that The Magic Mountain was published in Portugal under a brazilian translation.
Livros do Brasil was a legendary Publisher House such as Edições Europa-América, Almedina, Relógio D'Água, Editorial Presença and Edições 70 were too.

Mr. Caro translated into portuguese most of the Mann's books.
He is very known for having translated Max Frisch, Hermann Hesse, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig, Bertolt Brecht (some plays), Hermann Broch, Elias Canetti, Vicki Baum and many others germanic writers into portuguese.
Unfortunately, he never translated yiddish literature into Portuguese. Sad!

Another very known brazilian translator is Professor Irene Aron. She is still alive, but she is an elder.

Irene Aron was one of my professors at USP. If my memory doesn't fail me she translated Berlin Alexanderplatz after she retired. That was a great feat in itself, because of the different layers of language of the novel.

 

[Corswandt]

Wow, I didn't know that The Magic Mountain was published in Portugal under a brazilian translation.
Livros do Brasil was a legendary Publisher House such as Edições Europa-América, Almedina, Relógio D'Água, Editorial Presença and Edições 70 were too.

Mr. Caro translated into portuguese most of the Mann's books.
He is very known for having translated Max Frisch, Hermann Hesse, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig, Bertolt Brecht (some plays), Hermann Broch, Elias Canetti, Vicki Baum and many others germanic writers into portuguese.
Unfortunately, he never translated yiddish literature into Portuguese. Sad!

Another very known brazilian translator is Professor Irene Aron. She is still alive, but she is an elder.

My translation of Virginia Woolf's Orlando is also from Livros do Brasil, by Cecília Meireles, no less.

As for the PT publishing houses you mentioned:

Livros do Brasil - bought by the Porto Editora group (one of the Big Two); survives as an imprint.

Edições Europa-América - inactive since the late noughties, bankrupt 2019, liquidated with remaining assets sold at auction in 2020.

Almedina - a big player in the lucrative Law book business, remains active and independent (its largest competitor in that particular market, Coimbra Editora, went bankrupt and was liquidated last year).

Relógio D'Água - remains independent and very active; one of the leading publishers of quality literature (particularly translated) in Portugal.

Editorial Presença - remains active and has developed a few imprints. One of the largest publishers outside of the Big Two (perhaps Big Three now, with the new 20/20+Penguin Random House group).

Edições 70 - specialised in social sciences; bought by Almedina in 2005.

 

[Leseratte]

Do you know anything about Editora Abysmo @Corswandt ?

 

[Corswandt]

Do you know anything about Editora Abysmo @Corswandt ?

No, but I'm almost sure I've heard of them before.

In my own experience, a good place to keep up with what PT niche publishers such a Abysmo are doing is the website of Livraria Snob:

Livraria Snob

Livraria independente

www.livrariasnob.pt

You can search by publisher, and find some small ones (editoras de vão de escada, as I somewhat depreciatively call them) that you may not even be aware of.

[Apologies to thread starter for persistent off-topic posts]

 

[Benny Profane]

My translation of Virginia Woolf's Orlando is also from Livros do Brasil, by Cecília Meireles, no less.

As for the PT publishing houses you mentioned:

Livros do Brasil - bought by the Porto Editora group (one of the Big Two); survives as an imprint.

Edições Europa-América - inactive since the late noughties, bankrupt 2019, liquidated with remaining assets sold at auction in 2020.

Almedina - a big player in the lucrative Law book business, remains active and independent (its largest competitor in that particular market, Coimbra Editora, went bankrupt and was liquidated last year).

Relógio D'Água - remains independent and very active; one of the leading publishers of quality literature (particularly translated) in Portugal.

Editorial Presença - remains active and has developed a few imprints. One of the largest publishers outside of the Big Two (perhaps Big Three now, with the new 20/20+Penguin Random House group).

Edições 70 - specialised in social sciences; bought by Almedina in 2005.

Oh, Uncle Ciça!!! She was a great translator too!!!
And about Mrs. Dalloway: her translation (by Cecília Meireles) is the best version!
I have it too. My book is a part of a collection called Os Imortais da Literatura Universal. Mrs Dalloway is with Orlando in a simple volume in this collection.

And what about Cavalo de Ferro, Antígona and Dom Quixote? I noticed that they printed a lot of quality books too, but are they active yet?

 

[Corswandt]

[Moderators please feel free to move these posts to another thread]

And about Cavalo de Ferro, Antígona and Dom Quixote? I noticed that they printed a lot of quality books too, but are they active yet?

Cavalo de Ferro - specialised in translated fiction, particularly in less usual European languages; first attempt by its owners to sell it in 2009 was botched, later (4-5 years ago? more?) purchased by the 20/20 group, has remained active as an imprint of that group, which merged with Penguin Random House PT earlier this year.

Antígona - the epitome of the independent small/niche publishing house and perhaps the best known of those in PT in the sense that its books are the easiest to find; remains active.

Dom Quixote - absorbed by the grupo Leya (one of the Big Two alongside Porto Editora) in 2007. Remains active as an imprint of that group.

It's worth noting that the Big Two groups were both built around one of the two biggest publishers specialised in school textbooks (Porto Editora for the Porto Editora/Bertrand group and Texto Editora for the Leya group), which is one of the very few genuinely lucrative areas for the publishing business in PT. They began eating up other publishers during a quick process of kartelisation that began in the mid noughties and was basically finished by the early 2010s.

 

[Liam]

Digressions are fine, they are the life of any true discussion.

Besides, it's how new threads are born,

 

[Leseratte]

No, but I'm almost sure I've heard of them before.

In my own experience, a good place to keep up with what PT niche publishers such a Abysmo are doing is the website of Livraria Snob:

Livraria Snob

Livraria independente

www.livrariasnob.pt

You can search by publisher, and find some small ones (editoras de vão de escada, as I somewhat depreciatively call them) that you may not even be aware of.

[Apologies to thread starter for persistent off-topic posts]

Thanks, @Corswand!

 

[Corswandt]

Forgot the link to the Abysmo website. It's up to date.

Início - Abysmo

«Cada título possui voz e luz, que por aí circulam, dando sinal de vida discreta, mas pulsante. Mesmo os esgotados não se esgotaram.»

abysmo.pt

 

[Benny Profane]

Digressions are fine, they are the life of any true discussion.

Besides, it's how new threads are born,

I'm sorry, @Liam. It's my fault. I promise: that won't happen again!
Many thanks for your patience to make a new thread.

 

[Corswandt]

A couple more random, unsolicited notes about the Portuguese publishing business:

Not all late noughties/early 2010s attempts at concentration were successful. Former banker Paulo Teixeira Pinto bought several prestigious but fairly small publishing houses (Arcádia, Guimarães, Ática, Ulisseia, the larger but inactive Verbo and a few others, some of them effectively mothballed at the time) in the late noughties to form the Babel conglomerate in 2010, but by c. 2017 the Babel group itself as a whole was inactive, and there is no record of any sort of activity since the beginning of the COVID pandemic.

Also, during that period of concentration not all the existing publishers were absorbed into larger groups. Many just went bankrupt: Campo das Letras in 2009, Difel c. 2011, Civilização in 2014 (though it was only liquidated in c. 2018), Estampa in 2017, to add to those I've already mentioned.

 

[Leseratte]

A couple more random, unsolicited notes about the Portuguese publishing business:

Not all late noughties/early 2010s attempts at concentration were successful. Former banker Paulo Teixeira Pinto bought several prestigious but fairly small publishing houses (Arcádia, Guimarães, Ática, Ulisseia, the larger but inactive Verbo and a few others, some of them effectively mothballed at the time) in the late noughties to form the Babel conglomerate in 2010, but by c. 2017 the Babel group itself as a whole was inactive, and there is no record of any sort of activity since the beginning of the COVID pandemic.

Also, during that period of concentration not all the existing publishers were absorbed into larger groups. Many just went bankrupt: Difel c. 2011, Civilização in 2014 (though it was only liquidated in c. 2018), Estampa in 2017, to add to those I've already mentioned.

We had Ática in Brazil too. I don´t know if it is the same editor and if it still exists. And we had Civilização Brasileira.

 

[Benny Profane]

We had Ática in Brazil too. I don´t know if it is the same editor and if it still exists. And we had Civilização Brasileira.

Difel, Civilização Brasileira and Bertrand were a conglomerate in Brazil.
Only Bertrand group (PT and BR, Editora Record and Editora José Olympio in BR) exists in nowadays.
In Brazil, Bertrand is a label of Editora Record. In Portugal, it is a major publisher.

Ática BR isn't the same group in Portugal. Ática is a label of Editora Moderna (both specialized in handbooks for High School and literature for children/young adults).