Genre Literature in Other Languages

[Stewart]

When I'm out and about in the book shops, I mostly spend time in the general literature section, doing an A to Z scan for what's new. Occasionally I'll take a wander off the beaten track into the genre sections. A lot of the time, looking at the names available, it seems very anglophone in nature.

Sure I'll see Cuxin Liu among the sci-fi, The Witcher books of Andrzej Sapkowsk on the fantasy shelves, and lately I've seen Thomas Olde Heuvelt's novels in the horror section, but there doesn't seem to be that much of it translated. (Apart from the crime section, which has murder from all over the world.)

So, for those in non-anglophone countries, out of interest, how big are genres like sci-fi, fantasy, and horror in your countries? Is there much of a culture around them? Or are they dominated by writers translated from English?

 

[Benny Profane]

Great thread, @Stewart.

Well, in Brazil, we are big consumers of sci-fi, horror, speculative fiction, "romantic" novels and fantasy, in general.

We have some specialized Publishing Houses which publishes for a specific public. For example, "Editora Aleph" (sci-fi), "Editora Arqueiro" (fantasy), "Darkside Books" (horror, vampire and zombie), "Morro Branco" (speculative fiction) and independent Publishing Houses and authors which publishes on Amazon.
Some labels of major Publishing Houses have been publishing LGBTQIA+ authors for children and young adults (brazilians or foreign writers).

These houses publish foreign (majority) and brazilian authors.

Independent brazilian authors use to publish their works on independent sites as "fanfics" or "yaoi" (generally about "anime" characters).

I'm not a huge fan of these genres, maybe some few sci-fi, steampunk and cyberpunk authors, but I respect who likes them.

Well, we have also a peculiar sci-fi genre called as "roça punk" ("roça" in Portuguese could be "backward land" in English in an appropriate translation) regarding speculative fiction with nuances of sci-fi and cyberpunk, catastrophes around "backward" lands and "low life, high agrotechnology".

So, that's all!

 

[wordeater]

French: For fantasy and science fiction Jules Verne was a pioneer. Crime authors are Gaston Leroux, Georges Simenon and Boileau & Narcejac.

Dutch: There are some fantasy novels for children by Paul Biegel, Tonke Dragt and Jan Terlouw. Crime authors are Baantjer, Pieter Aspe, Jef Geeraerts, Saskia Noort and Marion Pauw.

Russian: Boris Akunin is a thriller author.

Swedish: Great thriller authors are Sjöwall & Wahlöo, Henning Mankell, Stieg Larsson and Camilla Läckberg.

 

[Verkhovensky]

Croatia has a long tradition of crime fiction, which is more or less accepted as a legitimate genre here, with some predominantly crime writers being elected members of Croatian Academy of Arts and crime novels routinely are shortlisted for or even given major literary awards.

But, as you already mentioned, crime fiction is now world-wide genre, so besides Anglo-American authors, Scandinavians, French, Italians etc. are also published here.

Sci-fi and fantasy are in the ghetto, and local practitioners are in another ghetto inside that ghetto I would say. They have their own awards, specialized publishers, conventions...
In translation you can find mostly only American titles, but most of the people interested in these genres simply read in English.

 

[redhead]

Sure I'll see Cuxin Liu among the sci-fi…

There’s also some other Chinese titles that are starting to be translated, and e-zines are starting to publish more translations as well. I’d recommend Invisible Planets, a collection of scifi stories from various authors all translated by Ken Liu.

Here’s a cool piece I enjoyed: Folding Beijing by Hao Jingfang:

Folding Beijing - Uncanny Magazine

Folding Beijing by Hao Jingfang (translated by Ken Liu). Uncanny Magazine Issue Two. Short fiction.

www.uncannymagazine.com

 

[Uemarasan]

The strongest genre literature in Japan is without a doubt the mystery genre. Older English-language authors remain popular (Agatha Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ellery Queen, John Dickson Carr), but for the most part the market is dominated by Japanese writers.

For those interested in lists, readers of mysteries in Japan voted on the top 100:

Tozai Mystery Best 100

 

[kpjayan]

What is being produced and consumed in India in the last 10 years or so is largely in 'Mythology' genre. I would say, this is largely by the writers in the English language (Devdutt Pattnaik, Chitra Devakurni, Amish Tripathi etc all) . Ancient epics of Mahabharata and Ramayana, are being used as the inspiration for various new-age reading and retelling. Of late, historical characters are also being subjected to this treatment.