Amazon, whose tense negotiations with Hachette in the past months have led them to slow ship-times for its books, offered last night “to fund 50% of an author pool—to be allocated by Hachette—to mitigate the impact of this dispute on author royalties, if Hachette funds the other 50%.” Of course, Hachette may find calculating and allocating damages awkward so soon after authors flexed their social-media muscle. Sidebar: Amazon claimed “989 of 1000” items sold would be unaffected by this continuing “business interruption,” which might mean a full 1.1 percent of their business comes from just one mid-sized traditional publisher—heartening news from an unlikely source.
Amazon responds to Hachette furor
Translation by the Numbers
Three Percent crunches the numbers on all the translated fiction and poetry published in the U.S. in 2009. The overall numbers were down in 2009 from 2008. The top language to be translated? Spanish, followed by French, German, Arabic, and Italian. (Thanks, Laurie)
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Born in Translation
Is the global literary marketplace changing the way that novelists write? Over at Public Books, Dora Zhang writes on Rebecca Walkowitz’s Born Translated and books that “appear simultaneously or nearly simultaneously in multiple languages.” Pair with this Millions piece on literary translators at work.
Asymptote’s Global Birthday Party
This year marks the second anniversary of Asymptote, an international journal focusing on literature in translation. The staff is commemorating the occasion by hosting a series of events in eight different locales around the globe: Beijing, Barcelona, Berlin, Islamabad, Chicago, Taipei, Singapore and New York City. Folks attending The Big Apple’s event on January 20th will get to see Millions contributor Reif Larsen live in action alongside Cole Swensen, Paul Legault, Adam Sorkin, and Ariana Reines.
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Figuratively Unbelievable
Getting sick of people who overuse the word “literally”? A new browser extension kindly replaces instances of the word with “figuratively.” At Slate, Will Oremus tries out a godsend for pedants. (A Millions piece by Fiona Maazel nicely complements his article.)
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Tuesday New Release Day
A week after it wins the Booker, Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall is now on American shelves. Jonathan Lethem’s newest Chronic City comes out today. Dave Eggers’ novelization of a movie based on a children’s book, Wild Things is out in standard and special fur-covered editions. A Lydia Davis-translated French “masterpiece” is out today from NYRB Classics.
Dear Reader
“Puzzled as to why her mother had not figured out “Miriam” on her own — or why, after Capote became famous, she did not say much about her letter and his answer — Ms. Akers sought clues.” The New York Times writes about recently discovered letter from Truman Capote to a young reader who misunderstood his first published story. Read our own Michael Bourne on the tragedy of Capote’s life.