#some % are averages over decades; others only for fiction or for novels & poetry etc so you end up comparing apples and oranges | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hedgehog-moss · 1 year

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[1] `there are often translations available in other languages long before English ones` This is really interesting! I'm familiar with translation in games, where english is often a very early target (a small game might get 0-5 translations, depending on amount of text) because the size of the market is larger.

[2] Do you happen to know why this is different for books? Is it faster to come to a deal about publication rights for some other languages to get started on the translation? Is translation to english harder (at least from French) than to say, Spanish?

The literary translation situation has long been very dismal in the English-speaking world! I don’t know a lot about video games, but are localisations provided by the company that makes the game? Because if that's the case it makes sense that games would get translated into English as a priority. For literary translations which are imported rather than exported, other countries have to decide to translate a foreign author and anglo countries (US, UK and Canada at least) are not very interested in foreign literature. There's something known as the "3% rule" in translation—i.e. about 3% of all published books in the US in any given year are translations. Some recent sources say this figure is outdated and it’s now something like 5% (... god) but note that it encompasses all translations, and most of it is technical translation (instruction manuals, etc). The percentage of novels in translation published in the UK is 5-6% from what I’ve read and it’s lower in the US. In France it's 33%, and that’s not unusually high compared to other European countries.

I don't think it's only because of the global influence of English* and the higher proportion of English speakers in other countries than [insert language] speakers in the US, or poor language education in schools etc, because just consider how many people in the US speak Spanish—I just looked it up and native Spanish speakers in the US represent nearly 2/3rds of the population of France, and yet in 2014 (most recent solid stat I could find) the US published only 67 books translated from Spanish. France with a much smaller % of native Spanish speakers (and literary market) published ~370 translations from Spanish that same year. All languages combined, the total number of new translations published in France in 2014 was 11,859; in Spain it was 19,865; the same year the US published 618 new translations. France translated more books from German alone (754) than the US did from all languages combined, and German is only our 3rd most translated language (and a distant third at that!). The number of new translations I found in the US in 2018 was 632 so the 3% figure is probably still accurate enough.

* When I say it’s not just about the global influence of English—obviously that plays a huge role but I mean there’s also a factor of cultural isolationism at play. If you take English out of the equation there’s still a lot more cultural exchange (in terms of literature) between other countries. Take Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead; it was published in 2009, and (to give a few examples) translated in Swedish 1 year later, in Russian & German 2 years later, in French, Danish & Italian 3 years later, in English 10 years later—only after she won the Nobel. I’m reminded of the former secretary for the Nobel Prize who said Americans “don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature” because they don’t translate enough. I think it's a similar phenomenon as the one described in the "How US culture ate the world" article; the US is more interested in exporting its culture than in importing cultural products from the rest of the world. And sure, anglo culture is spread over most continents so there’s still a diversity of voices that write in English (from India, South Africa, etc etc) but that creates pressure for authors to adopt English as their literary language. The dearth of English translation doesn’t just mean that monolingual anglophones are cut off from a lot of great literature, but also that authors who write in minority languages are cut off from the global visibility an English translation could give them, as it could serve as a bridge to be translated in a lot more languages, and as a way to become eligible for major literary prizes including the Nobel.

Considering that women are less translated than men and represent a minority (about 1/3) of that already abysmally low 3% figure, I find the recent successes of English translations of women writers encouraging—Olga Tokarczuk, Banana Yoshimoto, Han Kang, Valeria Luiselli, Samanta Schweblin, Sayaka Murata, Leila Slimani, of course Elena Ferrante... Hopefully this is a trend that continues & increases! I remember this New Yorker article from years ago, “Do You Have to Win the Nobel Prize to Be Translated?”, in which a US small press owner said “there’s just no demand in this country” (for translated works); but the article acknowledged that it’s also a chicken-and-egg problem. Traditional publishers who have the budget to market them properly don’t release many translations as (among other things) they think US readers are reluctant to read translated foreign literature, and the indie presses who release the lion’s share of translated works (I read it was about 80%) don’t have the budget to promote them so people don’t buy them so the assumption that readers aren’t interested lives on. So maybe social media can slowly change the situation by showing that anglo readers are interested in translated books if they just get to find out about them...

#ask #anyway it's difficult to find accurate stats for translation and compare between countries because some % you see are #for all translations and as i said technical translations / computer manuals etc make up the bulk of it #some % are averages over decades; others only for fiction or for novels & poetry etc so you end up comparing apples and oranges #but the fact remains that the three percent website (translation database) was able to list every single literary translation #published in the us year after year and it was never higher than 600-ish titles in the 2010s. it's not great #when you see much smaller countries release translations in the thousands or tens of thousands #it's also not a huge improvement over the 400-ish yearly US translations in the 00s #but they haven't released numbers for the past few years and maybe the situation is a bit better now

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christinaengela · 7 years

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Hello friends and fans!

Welcome to my 9th newsletter: September 2017 – jam-packed with tidbits and information about new releases and projects I’m currently busy with!

Coming up in this edition of Another Round @ The Crow Bar:Regular updates, new releases, and a monthly spotlight on one of my books, this time “The Time Saving Agency“, book 2 in The Quantum Series!

New Releases

2017 has been a VERY busy year for me, and looking back I feel a sense of accomplishment – if (certainly) not in the financial sense, then certainly in terms of the stories I’ve written and the worlds I’ve built! I now have 21 individual titles available – and with seven of them having been released for the first time in THIS year alone, it is quite the milestone for me!

In April 2017 I announced a new series – “Panic! Horror In Space” and the availability of the first volume in that series which featured two related short stores: “Mercury Rising” and “Mercury Resurgent”.

The second volume was released on the 10th of August, and features two more related short stories entitled “Dead Center” and “Through A Dark Glassy”. This is the 2nd volume in my new series – and it’s a series of horror misadventures in deep space with the crew of the starship Mercury.

In “Dead Center”, in order to repay a debt, Captain Flane accompanies the crew of the cult TV show “Specter Adventures” in a “lock-down” of the most haunted abandoned Terran outpost in the Galaxy, while “Through A Dark Glassy” explores the creepy consequences of placing a paper note reading “WARNING: ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY DO NOT OPEN” on a crate containing some of the most dangerous haunted items known to humanity – and then sending it away via a space courier service – and not in a hypothetical way either.

What, you may be asking yourself, is there to panic about? You can find out here.

SUMMARY: Also released by me so far during 2017:

“The Quantum Series – Keep Off The Crabbygrass” is an omnibus of The Quantum Series titles 1, 2, 3 and 4, containing “Black Sunrise”, “The Time Saving Agency”, “Dead Man’s Hammer” and “Loderunner”. “The Quantum Series – Keep Off The Crabbygrass” is available only in paperback and the original separate titles in pocketbook size – as well as the separate ebook versions will continue to be available.

“Galaxii – Into The Abyss” is an omnibus of The Galaxii Series titles 1,2 and 3, containing “Blachart“, “Demonspawn” and “Dead Beckoning” and was released on the 23rd June. At 363 pages in the new format, the print paperback copy containing all three stories in the Galaxii Series still works out cheaper than buying all three titles separately!

“High Steaks” is the sixth title in the The Quantum Series and the sequel to “Prodigal Sun“, which was launched in February! “High Steaks” continues the saga of the ‘third rate’ Terran colony on the planet Deanna, and the diverse characters the reader has no doubt by now become familiar with. Old familiar faces rub elbows with brand new characters in “Prodigal Sun”, some heroes, and some villains. Readers will remember the crotchety old military veterans of the Skegg’s Valley Dynamite Fishing Club, and of course, Fred the Arborian.

“The Peed-Off Peasant’s Collection Of Awesome Parking Memes“! Only available in ebook format. Meet the Peed-Off Peasant. He’s just an average Joe living an average life. He’s a regular underdog who hates getting trampled upon by the rich, entitled folks who think that money, wealth and power make them better than him, or more deserving of being treated like a decent human being. He stands up to these folks, demanding to be treated with dignity and respect – or at the very least, consideration.

The first episode in my new sci-fi horror series called “Panic! Horror In Space #1” was released on Thursday 6 April! This ongoing series tells the tale of the starship Mercury, which is perhaps the unluckiest Terran starship in history! “Panic! Horror In Space” is a series of science-fiction-horror stories in the same setting featuring some of the same characters in a series of short fiction installments.

“Prodigal Sun”, book 5 in The Quantum Series was released in early March. This title is the first new episode in the series in a decade! It heads off into a slightly darker direction than the previous titles, and if you want to know more about the story being told in “Prodigal Sun“, you can find more info here: NEW RELEASE: “Prodigal Sun” and What Readers Can Expect In “Prodigal Sun”, “High Steaks” & “The Last Hurrah”.

So yes, as you can see, 2017 has been an extremely productive year for me in terms of writing and publishing! It’s not over yet of course, and there will still be more releases before the end of the year.

The Galaxii Series

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Blachart by Christina Engela

Demonspawn by Christina Engela

Dead Man’s Hammer by Christina Engela

Galaxii – Into The Abyss by Christina Engela

“Galaxii – Into The Abyss” – a special omnibus of all three already released titles in the Galaxii Series, was released on 23 June and is only available in paperback 6″ x 9″ format. Work on book 4, “Where Darkness Softly Treads” is still pending due to other projects at this time.

The Quantum Series

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Black Sunrise by Christina Engela

The Time Saving Agency by Christina Engela

Dead Man’s Hammer by Christina Engela

Loderunner by Christina Engela

High Steaks by Christina Engela

The Quantum Series – Keep Off The Crabbygrass by Christina Engela

“The Quantum Series – Keep Off The Crabbygrass”, an omnibus of The Quantum Series titles 1, 2, 3 and 4 (“Black Sunrise”, “The Time Saving Agency”, “Dead Man’s Hammer” and “Loderunner”) was released in July 2017.

“Underground Movement“, a short novella and supplemental title that slots between book 6 and 7 in The Quantum Series, set immediately after the sixth novel (“High Steaks”) continues the saga of the ‘third rate’ Terran colony on the planet Deanna and the diverse characters you readers have no doubt by now become familiar with! This is still under way, and tells the story of the fearless fighters of the Deannan Resistance!

About The Quantum Series will give you more background about the series, its settings and characters. To get a better idea of what the latest two titles are about, read What Readers Can Expect In “Prodigal Sun”, “High Steaks”, “Fortitude” & “The Last Hurrah”.

Panic! Horror In Space

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Panic! Horror In Space #1 by Christina Engela

Panic! Horror In Space #2 by Christina Engela

Panic! is a sci-fi/horror series, which will have some decidedly sci-fi characters encountering some decidedly horror entities – ghosts, haunted objects, zombies, etc. along with my usual twisted brand of humor! The first two titles are available in paperback and ebook versions on various distribution platforms including Amazon and Lulu. “Panic! Horror In Space #1” was released earlier this year, and “Panic! Horror In Space #2” is now also available as of 10 August 2017.

I’ve also started on the third installment in the meantime.

For more detail about this series, visit About Panic! Horror In Space.

Short Fiction