Tomorrow, as part of Scott’s month-long Reading the World series, I’ll have a review of Per Petterson’s In the Wake up at Conversational Reading. Reading the World is focused on “bringing international voices to the attention of readers,” and reading In the Wake and considering it as a “work in translation” rather than simply a novel got me thinking about how much non-English language reading I actually do. As it turns out, I don’t read many books that weren’t written in English. I don’t think this is necessarily a deficiency, but considering how much I’ve enjoyed the literature in translation that I’ve read, it seems I should seek these books out more often. Here are the books in translation I’ve read over the last few years (As you might expect, Ryszard Kapuscinski figures heavily.)
2003:
- Imperium by Ryszard Kapuscinski
- The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll by Alvaro Mutis
- The Lonely Hearts Club by Raul Nunez – my thoughts
- The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuscinski
2004:
- Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes – my thoughts
- Shah of Shahs by Ryszard Kapuscinski my thoughts
2005:
- Generations of Winter by Vassily Aksyonov my thoughts
- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas – my thoughts
2006:
- Television by Jean-Philippe Toussaint
- White Spirit by Paule Constant
- Wizard of the Crow by Ngugi Wa’Thiong’O – Garth’s review
2007:
- In the Wake by Per Petterson
