Read Russia Journal

The Russian Library @ 25

by Christine Dunbar

Book cover of The SymphoniesThe 2021 publication of Andrei Bely’s The Symphonies, in a translation by Jonathan Stone, has now brought the number of books in Columbia University Press’s Russian Library series to 25. Reviewers have hailed the book for its “otherworldly tales of haunting beauty” and as “a welcome addition to the canon of classic Russian literature in English.”

Jon Stone’s scholarly work on Russian Symbolism is highly regarded in the field, but I was skeptical when he contacted me about a translation of Bely’s “Northern Symphony.” Andrei Bely is a major figure in the Russian literary tradition, and the chapter on him in Vladislav Khodasevich’s Necropolis is one of my favorites. (Necropolis appeared in the Russian Library in 2019 in Sarah Vitali’s sharp and meticulous translation.) Bely is known primarily for his novel Petersburg, and the Russian Library is not a completist project. Our goal is to broaden the variety of Russian literature available to entertain, challenge, and inspire the Anglophone reader.

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RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK 2019

May 20–24 in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington DC

RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK 2019 presents a series of conversations featuring Russia’s acclaimed new authors, famed translators of Russian fiction, and leading Russian literature scholars and critics.  RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK 2019 will take place May 20-24 in literary venues across New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC – and, as always, online.

MONDAY, MAY 20                                                                          New York City

Read Russia presents: Olga Slavnikova                                                         
A conversation between Olga Slavnikova, author; Marian Schwartz, translator; and Ian Dreiblatt, poet and translator
Sponsored by the Russian Library / Columbia University Press

VENUE:
Grolier Club                                                                                        6:30 PM
47 East 60th Street
New York, NY 10022


TUESDAY, MAY 21                                                                         Washington, DC

Guzel Yakhina presents Zuleika

VENUE:                                                                                              11:00 AM

Kennan Institute
Woodrow Wilson Center
1300 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington, DC 20004

https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/book-talk-zuleikha

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2018 READ RUSSIA PRIZE for the best translation of Russian literature into English

The READ RUSSIA PRIZE Jury is pleased to announce the winner of the 2018 READ RUSSIA PRIZE for the best translation of Russian literature into English!

WINNER:

Teffi (Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya)
Memories: From Moscow to the Black Sea
Translated by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler, Anne Marie Jackson, and Irina Steinberg
New York Review Books / Pushkin Press (2016)


SPECIAL MENTIONS:

Russian Émigré Short Stories from Bunin to Yankovsky
Edited by Bryan Karetnyk
Translated by Maria Bloshteyn, Robert Chandler, Justin Doherty, Boris Dralyuk, Rose France, Bryan Karetnyk, Dmitri Nabokov, Donald Rayfield, Irina Steinberg, and Anastasia Tolstoy
Penguin (2017)

Iliazd (Ilia Zdanevich)
Rapture
Translated by Thomas J. Kitson
Columbia University Press (2017)

The awards ceremony for the 2018 READ RUSSIA PRIZE was held during the 2018 London Book Fair on Wednesday, April 11 at Waterstones Piccadilly (203 – 206 Piccadilly), London, UNITED KINGDOM. 

ABOUT THE READ RUSSIA PRIZE

The READ RUSSIA PRIZE is awarded for works of Russian literature published in new English translations. All publishers of Russian literature in English translation may submit published works. Winners receive an award of up to $10,000, divided at the discretion of the Prize jury between the translator(s) of the work and the English-language publishing house. Previous winners include Oliver Ready, for his translation of the novel Before and During by Russian author Vladimir Sharov (Dedalus Books) and Joanna Turnbull and Nikolai Formozov for their translation of Autobiography of a Corpse, a collection of tales from Russian writer Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky (New York Review Books). 

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RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK – 2017: A FESTIVAL OF TRANSLATION!

Read Russia Literature Week poster image

RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK 2017 presents a series of panels, screenings, and in-person conversations featuring some of Russia’s most acclaimed new authors, famed translators of Russian fiction, and several of the world’s leading Russian literature scholars and literary critics.

RUSSIAN LITERATURE WEEK 2017 will take place May 1-6 in literary venues across New York City including Book Culture, the Strand Bookstore, New York University, Columbia University, the Grolier Club, and the Russian Samovar restaurant – and, as always, online.

MONDAY – MAY 1

7:00 pm (doors open at 6:30 pm)
The Russian Literary Matrix: Contemporary Russian Writers Reflect on the Classics
Lisa Hayden, Vadim Levental, Marina Stepnova, Maya Kucherskaya, Pavel Basinsky, Andrei Gelasimov
The Grolier Club
47 E 60th St, New York, NY 10022

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Online film screening: The Black Monk by Anton Chekhov


TUESDAY – MAY 2

4:30 pm
The Art of Translation: A Literary Roundtable
with Ruth Franklin, Antonina W. Bouis, Tom Kitson, Marian Schwartz, and Lisa Hayden
Co-sponsored by Columbia University Press, the Columbia University Slavic Department, and the Harriman Institute
Kellogg Center, Columbia University
420 W 118th St, New York, NY 10027

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Read Russia at the 2017 London Book Fair

image of a London Book Fair ticket

At the 2017 London Book Fair, March 14-16, Read Russia will showcase more than 450 new titles – with a focus on works by Russian writers whose major anniversaries are being celebrated in 2017, among them Bella Akhmadulina, Valentin Kataev, Vladimir Makanin, Konstantin Paustovsky, Marina Tsvetaeva, and Maximilian Voloshin.

The public program will include talks and discussions with Russian writers, presentations of new translations of Russian literary works into English, and announcements of new funding opportunities for publishers and translators.  Renowned British literary translators Arch Tait, Donald Rayfield, and John Farndon will present their newest works, and Read Russia will host a series of conversations with award-winning writers Alexey Ivanov, Valery Bochkov, Alisa Ganieva, Marina Stepnova, and Vadim Levental. Film screenings include “My Own Honor Bright,” directed by Alexander Karpilovsky, based on the book by Mikhail Seslavinsky; and “The Backbone of Russia,” Alexey Ivanov’s four-episode documentary series produced with journalist, television host, and director Leonid Parfenov and producer Julia Zaitseva, exploring the culture of the Urals.

Read Russia events will be held at the Russian stand at Olympia and at London cultural venues including Waterstones Piccadilly and Pushkin House.

Tuesday, March 14

11:00 – 12:00
Opening of the Russian National Stand
Venue: Olympia Exhibition Centre, Hammersmith Road, London W14 8 UX, Stand 5 F111
Language: Russian with English translation

12:30 – 13:00
Presentation. The Read Russia Prize – celebrating the best translations of Russian literature
Venue: Olympia Exhibition Centre, Stand 5 F111
Language: Russian with English translation

14:00 -15:00
Roundtable discussion. How to Make Russian Literature Even More Popular
Participants: Julia Goumen, literary agent; literary translators Donald Rayfield and Arch Tait; and Karina Karmenian, Director of St. James's Publishing and Russian Children's Book Festival
Venue: Olympia Exhibition Centre, Stand 5 F111
Language: English

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Read Russia and Columbia University Press present the RUSSIAN LIBRARY

An Overview of the Inaugural Russian Library Titles

By Christine Dunbar

One of the defining features of the Russian Library is its generic diversity. This is particularly significant for an Anglophone audience, because we tend to think of the Russian literary tradition as one that derives its greatness from novels, primarily the 19th century masterpieces of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. Others think first of Chekhov’s fin-de-siècle plays, which have become part of the Western canon in large part because of their connection to Stanislavsky and eventually to method acting. Russians, and for that matter, scholars of Russian, are more likely to consider poetry the best and most powerful iteration of Russian letters.

The first three books in the Russian Library will publish in December, and while the three have much in common—linguistic virtuosity being the most obvious example—they amply demonstrate the profusion of genres that make up Russian literature. Before going any farther, let me digress momentarily to admit that I am and will be referring to genre in a fairly unsophisticated manner. I believe that it is generally more productive to think of a work as exhibiting certain generic characteristics, rather than belonging to a genre. However, obeying the generic conventions of the blog post, I’m not going to get too hung up on it here.

Andrei Platonov (1899-1951) was a supporter of the 1917 revolution, and in both his best-known novel The Foundation Pit and the plays in the Russian Library volume Fourteen Little Red Huts and Other Plays one can see his sympathy for the dream of communism, even as he absolutely eviscerates the policies and realities of the contemporary Soviet Union. Fourteen Little Red Huts and Other Plays contains two plays written in the early 1930s as direct reactions to the travails of collectivization and the resulting famine. (Estimates vary, but most place the death toll of the famine at between 5.5 and 8 million.)

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