Translating Taiwan: Meetings with Literary Translators features interviews with several translators --- including into English, French, Japanese and German --- and identifies one unique focus: In terms of subject matter, gender is a popular theme among Taiwanese writers of all ages. This shared commitment reflects Taiwan's persistent struggles for gender equality over the decades, as … Continue reading Translating Taiwan: Gender is a Popular Theme
Category: Interviews: Authors and Translators (作家与译者的采访)
Q & A: The Status of Contemporary “AfroLit4China”
Several years ago, I noticed that China was importing huge amounts of mineral resources from Africa, and busy signing contracts to collaborate in the long-term exploitation of even more. I wondered: But what was the People's Republic importing from Africa, in terms of 文化产品, i.e., "cultural products," an awkward, Marxist-sounding term that one often hears in Mandarin? To satisfy … Continue reading Q & A: The Status of Contemporary “AfroLit4China”
Ece Temelkuran: Novels by Provocative Turkish Writer Coming Soon to China
专访｜土耳其作家伊切：伊斯坦布尔是帝国，安卡拉是共和国 Nov 5 2017 Update: Women Who Blow on Knots Wins 2017 Edinburgh International Book Festival Prize 11.15 更新：《吹开绳结的女人》获爱丁堡国际图书节处女作奖 In a welcome move to break the near-monopoly of fiction sourced from a familiar pool of American, European and Japanese writers, a batch of new Turkish works will be appearing in bookstores throughout China in 2017. And … Continue reading Ece Temelkuran: Novels by Provocative Turkish Writer Coming Soon to China
Profile: Xinjiang-based Uyghur Writer Perhat Tursun
In Meet China’s Salman Rushdie, Foreign Policy’s Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian profiles Xinjiang's controversial Uyghur writer Perhat Tursun (پەرھات تۇرسۇن, 帕尔哈提·吐尔逊): Perhat is the author of The Art of Suicide [自杀的艺术], a novel decried as anti-Islamic that in 1999 set off a religious firestorm among Uighurs, the largely Muslim, Turkic minority concentrated in the nominally autonomous Chinese … Continue reading Profile: Xinjiang-based Uyghur Writer Perhat Tursun
The Transparent Translator: Cindy Carter on “Dream of Ding Village”
Here’s my interview with Cindy Carter, Chinese-to-English translator of Dream of Ding Village: Bruce Humes: You studied Japanese and lived in Japan for several years before moving to Beijing. Has your knowledge of Japanese, the people and/or the language been useful to you in mastering Chinese? What made you willing to leave Japan to pursue … Continue reading The Transparent Translator: Cindy Carter on “Dream of Ding Village”
Translator interview: Stéphane Lévêque, Chinese-to-French translator of Fan Wen’s “Harmonious Land”
As those knowledgeable about Chinese literature in translation may have noted, one occasionally finds European publishers---particularly in France---are willing to translate and publish Chinese fiction long before these "unknown" authors are "discovered" by the English-speaking world. Ethnic ChinaLit spoke recently with Stéphane Lévêque, who is busy translating Harmonious Land (水乳大地) into French, the first novel [May … Continue reading Translator interview: Stéphane Lévêque, Chinese-to-French translator of Fan Wen’s “Harmonious Land”
Fan Wen: New Novel to Explore Culture Clash behind Kunming-Haiphong
Fan Wen (范稳), the Chinese Catholic author who recently completed his fictional trilogy spotlighting cultural and religious collisions in the "multicultural wonderland" of the Yunnan-Tibet border, now has another historical novel in mind, 碧色寨 (Bisezhai Station). The first book in the published series, Harmonious Land (水乳大地), recounts the tale of a multi-ethnic settlement in Lancangjiang Canyon … Continue reading Fan Wen: New Novel to Explore Culture Clash behind Kunming-Haiphong
Fan Wen’s Yunnan-Tibetan Trilogy: A Catholic Chinese Author’s Imagination Takes Flight
The China Daily features a piece on the third and final novel in a trilogy exploring the border on either side of Yunnan and Tibet: At last author Fan Wen (范稳) has his reward for a decade of immersion in the multicultural wonderland along the Yunnan-Tibet border: Canticle to the Land (大地雅歌), the closing novel … Continue reading Fan Wen’s Yunnan-Tibetan Trilogy: A Catholic Chinese Author’s Imagination Takes Flight
Interview: Author Murong Xuecun (慕容雪村) on his Undercover Role Investigating a Chinese Pyramid Scheme
Murong Xuecun has gained a name for himself through his unflattering vignettes of gambling, drinking, whoring and corruption in contemporary China. His best-seller, Leave me Alone: A Novel of Chengdu (成都，今夜请将我遗忘), prompted the authorities to convene a conference solely to critique the novel for sullying the Sichuan city’s image. But in a change of tack … Continue reading Interview: Author Murong Xuecun (慕容雪村) on his Undercover Role Investigating a Chinese Pyramid Scheme
Interview with China Novelist Fan Wen: A Century of Cultural Collisions in Shangri-la
Shuiru Dadi tells the tale of a multi-ethnic settlement in Lancangjiang Canyon—Gateway to Tibet—beset by battles between arrogant French Catholic missionaries, incompetent Han officials and their marauding troops, Naxi Dongba Shamanists, and the dominant Tibetans, not all of whom lead pacific, vegetarian lives in the local lamasery. The saga spans most of the 20th century, hopping … Continue reading Interview with China Novelist Fan Wen: A Century of Cultural Collisions in Shangri-la
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