Writing fiction itself might be (and often is) considered an act of translation: from experience to language, from emotion to logic, from chaos to legibility. Perhaps it is a mere coincidence, or a stroke of good luck, then that these three fall debut novelists selected for our craft series each have backgrounds in literary translation. […] The post Three Literary Translators Discuss Their Paths to Writing Their Debut Novels appeared first on Electric Literature. Continue reading at 'Electric Literature'
[ Electric Literature | 2024-12-17 12:00:00 UTC ]
My first novel was released within six months of Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance’s memoir of Appalachian roots and a youth spent in a Rust Belt community with a dearth of jobs and resources. Vance’s book came out just before the 2016 election; mine was released just after. Donald Trump’s victory had... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-11-17 12:01:45 UTC ]
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Every year, we ask The Center for Fiction First Novel Prize Finalists to reminisce about the first book they fell in love with. This year, we asked Finalists to reflect not just on the first story that stole their heart, but the story that seeded curiosity and empathy for the plight of others... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-11-17 09:48:30 UTC ]
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Imagine bookstores, libraries and life really, without Anne Frank, The Little Prince, the Quran, and Murakami. This is what a world without literary translators would look like—our literary travels would be devoid of global textures and much, much less rich. Through the work of translators,... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-11-06 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Colm Tóibín gives the third installment to the Words Ireland Lecture Series. This modern master discusses the craft of James Joyce—and the idea of craft itself. Is craft a concept more suited to poetry? Could strict ideas around craft actually be a hindrance to novelists and short story writers?... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-11-04 09:48:28 UTC ]
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In her first novel published in 14 years, author Julia Alvarez explores grief, isolation, and sisterhood. Afterlife follows Antonia, a writer and retiring English professor, who has just lost her husband Sam. As she reimagines what her life will be without her husband, Antonia also struggles... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-11-02 12:00:33 UTC ]
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AS AN EXPRESSIVE MEDIUM, video games have a strange way of reducing central concepts of modernist art and theory to basic operational elements. The technical specifications of “point of view” that have preoccupied novelists since the turn of the 20th century are crudely literalized within game... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books
[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-10-31 17:00:02 UTC ]
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There’s no denying that this is a rough—if not catastrophic—year for many businesses, from mom-and-pop-run local eateries to huge corporations like Macy’s. But as the Washington Post noted, a national array of bookstores and readerly good-will has helped Bookshop.org raise millions for indie... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-28 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Writers Rachel Howzell Hall, Attica Locke and Ivy Pochoda talked with Times reporter James Queally for a 2020 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books event. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-10-24 16:06:42 UTC ]
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One of my most vivid childhood memories took place in an English bookshop in Causeway Bay, a short minibus ride from my family home in Hong Kong. I was a voracious reader growing up, eyes constantly trained on any printed text available, even during dinnertime and when brushing my teeth. Intent... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-22 11:00:06 UTC ]
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In the thirteen years since Tana French published her first novel, she’s gained a rabid and dedicated readership (a friend of mine refers to herself as a Tanavangelist), a shelf’s worth of awards (Edgar, Anthony, Macavity, Barry, and the Irish Book Award, among others), and countless places on... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-15 11:00:19 UTC ]
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“You think you’ve known someone for a long time,” a character in one of Jenny Bhatt’s short stories says of her Indian colleague shortly after he’s shot dead by a white man in a bar. “Maybe he never really took to us. Never really became one of us.” Turn by turn, each of his white […] The post... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-13 11:00:00 UTC ]
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What lengths will we go to in order to belong? To be part of something exclusive? To be part of a sisterhood or brotherhood? That’s the searing question that authors Benjamin Nugent and Genevieve Sly Crane try to answer in their books about college Greek life. Nugent’s Fraternity, a collection... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-02 11:00:00 UTC ]
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In his memoir Children of the Land, Marcelo Hernandez Castillo tells the story of growing up undocumented in California and having to navigate the convoluted and dehumanizing American immigration system. Hernandez Castillo captures the emotional and psychological toll that being both invisible... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-10-01 11:00:54 UTC ]
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Before writing my debut novel Bestiary, I began a year-long process of translating letters written by my grandmother, many of which were addressed to people I didn’t know. While attempting these translations, I realized the impossibilities and possibilities of the task—the losses and gaps and... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-28 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Autumn means changing leaves, apple-based baked goods, decorative gourds, pumpkin spice lattes—and an avalanche of literary award longlists. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by all the must-read National Book Award nominees you’re now realizing you didn’t read, why not base your TBR pile off of... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-25 11:00:06 UTC ]
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Science journalist and debut author Angela Chen remembers the first time she saw the word “asexuality”—online, on the Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN). I don’t remember the first time I saw the word, though I know I first used it in the negative—as in, I may have “weird” views on... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-21 11:00:38 UTC ]
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In order to fit more texts into my Asian American literature course, I sometimes assign the play adaptation of Jessica Hagedorn’s novel Dogeaters. The novel is canonized within Asian American literature and features an imagined version of the Philippines made from film and radio tropes, found... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-17 11:00:54 UTC ]
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With no room for Hilary Mantel’s conclusion to her Wolf Hall trilogy, the six finalists also include four debutsHilary Mantel will not win a third Booker prize with the final novel in her Thomas Cromwell trilogy, after American writers made a near clean sweep of this year’s shortlist.With four... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-09-15 12:21:07 UTC ]
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Yaa Gyasi’s debut novel Homegoing told the story of two branches of a Ghanaian family, one descended from a woman who marries a white slave trader and whose line stays in Ghana, another descended from her half-sister who is captured and sent to America in bondage. Gyasi’s second novel... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-11 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Pigs They are born in a flood of magma. They claw their way to the center of the earth. They don’t know what a blouse is, and they don’t care. There are seventeen constellations named for their kin. They coordinate all the Monday briefings. When they read the wrong books, they return them to... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2020-08-31 11:00:00 UTC ]
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