A book comes home

The Independent has a review of Don Bartlett's translation of Beatles, the 1984 novel by Lars Saabye Christensen:

Unbelievably, Beatles was almost lost to the world. Having written the entire tome by hand, Saabye Christensen thought it might interest his old schoolmates at most, and carelessly stuffed the script in a suitcase travelling from France. The suitcase got lost, but found its way back to Oslo after a two-week European round trip that took in London. "Which was only right and fitting," the author says. "Now the book has come home, so to speak."

Short memories

The Independent's Boyd Tonkin on Norway:

Here we have a country whose foreign minister, part of a "red-green" coalition, not only writes a reflective and strong-selling book about his country's global responsibilities. He turns up at a literary conference to affirm the central role of authors and translators in his nation's life. British Euro-scepticism has only one political meaning: knuckle-headed, foreigner-scorning insularity. In Norway, it can mean the exact opposite. Would our Brussels-bashers really feel at home in Oslo?

Elsewhere, the news (pdf) that Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World is to be reissued in the U.K.

Some people apparently have short memories.

Nationalism and the North

Reading Tom Gallagher's account at Harry's Place of the (to me, almost surrealistically strange) rapprochement between Scotland's Nationalist Party and extreme Islamist groupings in Scottish society, I was struck by a couple of paragraphs:

Scotland is enjoying an elaborate cultural makeover. A new stereotypical collective identity is being unfurled. It involves repackaging poets, artists and musicians as troubadours for Nationalism as well as high-profile festivals in the winter months where public participation will be tirelessly urged irrespective of the Scottish weather, and Gaelic lettering and Saltire flags emblazoned on every conceivable public space.

Such cultural propaganda, when tried out in Ireland, was mercilessly lampooned by satirists like Flann O’Brien. But in Scotland our stand-up comics and acerbic columnists for a long time have only had the United States, the wicked bankers, and despoilers of the environment in their sights. So the SNP’s bid to have us all marching in step to the same patriotic tunes along rain-washed Scottish streets has a good chance of success.

This cultural campaign is not something that has appeared overnight, and it has roots which can be observed. A few years ago, after more than 30 years of absence from the country where I was raised and educated, though not born, I decided to accept an invitation to take part in some events in Scotland that were, at least in part, funded by an ambitious pan-Nordic project called Network North. The project aimed, in the words of the official brochure,

to further links between the Nordic countries and adjacent areas in the northwest of Europe, particularly Scotland, Northern Ireland and Ireland. The project focused on the creation of a network of contacts and co-operative ventures in the fields of contemporary art and culture, including drama, folk music, music, film, literature and visual art.

Quite why the project targeted Scotland, Northern Ireland and Ireland, to the exclusion of, say, England or the Netherlands (both equally, one might have thought, "adjacent areas", and a part of northern Europe) is still not clear to me, but at any rate it gave rise to some new ideas and meetings. One of those was a week in 2002 at the Arvon Foundation house at Moniack Mhor, in a picturesque setting on a hillside in Invernessshire. This was a residential seminar for Nordic, Scottish and Welsh poets and their English-language translators, among whom were the Finland-Swedish poet Gösta Ågren, the Norwegian poet Arne Rust, the Icelandic poet Thorarinn Eldjárn, the translator Bernard Scudder (who died in 2007), the Shetland poet Christine Da Luca and your truly. The week was certainly interesting. and some of the translation projects and workshops were probably unique (one of them involved a poem in Shetland dialect being translated into Welsh and Danish). The New Zealander Robyn Marsack of the Scottish Poetry Library, which organized the event, wrote an account of it here. But I was struck by some of the assumptions that seemed to underlie the proceedings - particularly the notion that there was some sort of link between Scotland's (or Shetland's?) aspirations to independence and the actual status of Nordic nations in the world today.

This sense of an extra-literary agenda was further reinforced by another Network North project I took part in, again hosted by the SPL, which involved the creation of a facing-text anthology of Finnish poetry, with translations into English and Scottish dialect. This time there was a definite sense of cultural parallelism - Finnish and Scottish poetry were somehow being seen as being related in a way that would not be true, for example, of Finnish and English poetry.

Although I was pleased to be invited to these events, and in some ways had looked forward to them as a kind of "homecoming", I remember finding it strange that at readings or simply in introductions I was usually presented as "the translator David McDuff from London". I'd have preferred to be introduced as "the Scottish translator David McDuff", or maybe just "the translator David McDuff", but found that wherever I went and whomever I spoke to, I was invariably seen as a foreigner "of Scottish parentage". This still seems odd to me, and it's one of the reasons why, apart from a visit to the St Andrews Poetry Festival with the Finnish poets Lauri Otonkoski and Anni Sumari in 2005, I haven't been back to Scotland again. Perhaps I was wrong in the assumptions I made at the time - but, having read Tom Gallagher, I'm not so sure that I was.

Undoing the Curse

The news that Norwegian author Per Petterson's novel Jeg forbanner tidens elv ( I Curse the River of Time, Aschehoug 2008) has taken the 2009 Nordic Council Literature Prize (see Literary Saloon for April 4) returns us to the question of the non-Nordic reading public's exposure to Scandinavian writing that can't be classified as crime writing - increasingly the only Nordic literary genre that seems to be able to make it overseas. Last year the English-language rights to Petterson's book in the translation now being prepared by Anne Born with the author were quickly grabbed by the ever watchful Harvill Secker (partnered with Graywolf Press in the US), which promotes works by heavyweight Nordic crime authors Arnaldur Indridason and Hanning Mankell.

As James Campbell pointed out in his article/interview published in the Guardian earlier this year, like the author's earlier books (including the Anne Born-translated Out Stealing Horses) this one claims no affiliation to the techniques and procedures of crime writing, but relies for its appeal on a literary style that owes something to Ernest Hemingway and Raymond Carver. Yet, as with the earlier novel, there still remains a question-mark over the degree to which such writing may compete in marketing and sales terms with the runaway success of the burgeoning Nordic crime series:

Gina Winje, who runs Norla, the government office for promoting Norwegian literature abroad, says that "the last few years have seen an increased interest in the English-speaking world". With his new imprint, [Christopher] MacLehose [director of Harvill Secker former director of Harvill Press] is enjoying the current popularity of Scandinavian crime writers. "Whether literary writers will follow Per in such numbers is open to question. But it is undoubtedly the case that Norwegian writing is at a high point."

Certainly, with the bad press Norway has been receiving with regard to one or two controversial aspects of its foreign policy lately, the presence of some decent Norwegian books in English may play an important role in improving the country's image around the world - and so one wishes this new Harvill Secker venture all the best.

Anti-Semitism in Norway - 3

Some readers may wonder why, on a translation blog, we are paying so much attention to the current upsurge of anti-Semitism in Norway. After all, Norway is a small country, and what happens within the fabric of its social structure is unlikely to effect major changes in the outside world. Well, we believe that Nordic translators have a special responsibility in an area like this. After all, we, or some of us, are engaged in the task of bringing Norwegian literature and new writing to the the English-speaking world and beyond. And in Norway, as in many other countries, writers,essayists, journalists and poets are part of the media establishment - as such, they reflect and influence public attitudes in Norway, and often bring them to expression.

A destructive phenomenon like widespread anti-Semitism is an indicator that something may be wrong with a society that nurtures it. As in other European countries, including the U.K., it cannot be dismissed as simply a reaction to events in Gaza or Lebanon. The recent willing participation of a Norwegian government figure, the Norwegian finance minister, in a demonstration which was characterized by the chanting of anti-Semitic slogans, cannot be a good sign. Yet we refuse to believe that the whole of Norwegian society is affected this way. The Tundra Tabloids blog, which writes about social and political trends in the Nordic countries, especially Finland, has recently extended its coverage to Norway. A reader of TT recently sent a letter to that blog, and we are taking the liberty of reproducing it here, as we believe that it reflects the true state of affairs in Norway today where the present topic is concerned. We would not normally publish a whole text like this: but we consider that the subject is important enough to warrant a full reproduction of the text, particularly as the letter also points to the possibility of developments in a more positive direction.

TT reader Bent writes:

Sadly enough, it is true that anti-Israel attitudes in Norway are both increasing and to some extent turning into anti-Semitism. There are several reasons for this. One is the radical increase in the number of Muslims being allowed to enter Norway and live for free on its irresponsible welfare system. Left wing political parties try to accommodate Islamic attitudes in order to gain or keep their votes (83 % of the Muslim community vote on socialist parties). And that means to some extent supporting anti-Semitism.

Another, larger, reason is the left wing takeover of the media, both newspapers and TV. Almost all journalists in Norway today are socialists; a situation has existed for 30 years now. There is not a single “rightwing” newspaper left in Norway today! This situation has of course resulted in objectivity losing out to unbalanced leftist subjectivity. And since left-wingers really never liked Israel anyway (they are too successful, and left wingers neither like successful people nor successful countries), fostering of anti-Israel attitudes has been a left wing agenda for at least three decades. We find the same situation in universities all over the country.

The result is that anti-Israel attitudes are no longer a phenomenon isolated to left wing radicals and neo-Nazi “rednecks” (called “extreme right wing”, but they of cause belong to the left). Today a vast majority of social democrats strongly dislike Israel, and this dislike has infiltrated all political parties and the populace at large, so that today there are probably more Norwegians with anti-Israel attitudes than not.

By this I mean people that dislike or do not trust Israel, but instead support Palestinians, and hold that Israel in large is the cause of trouble in the Middle East, not Hamas and/or the Palestinians. In fact, a poll published January 27th 2009 (Dagbladet) showed that 50 % of all Norwegians are antagonistic towards Israel. Not only that: Even before the war in Gaza an opinion poll showed that 18 % of the Norwegian population no longer recognise Israel’s right to exist as a sovereign state, and the proportion in the age group between 18 and 25 with this opinion is 35 %. An alarmingly high proportion!

The situation is far worse among politicians. Today there are only two political parties left (represented in Parliament), where anti-Israel attitudes do not dominate: the Progressive Party and the Norwegian Christian Democratic Party. The other parties are becoming more and more antagonistic towards Israel, and more and more willing to “go to bed” with Islamist radicals. This is especially true of the Socialist Left Party, the radical socialist party to which Kristin Halvorsen, the Minister of Finance, belongs.

The fact that Halvorsen willingly participated in a hateful anti-Israel demonstration (before it became violent, which such demonstrations often do after “the elite” leaves the scene) is not accidental. It is on the contrary a classic case of how Norwegian radical socialists behave. Those who disbelieve that a socialist Government Minister in Norway would be irresponsible enough to engage in such a hateful demonstration, please visit http://frittforum.diskusjoner.com/voldelig-demonstrasjon-i-oslo-t1865.html?mforum=frittforum and scroll down to (the first) picture.

The picture shows Halvorsen amongst the demonstrators and on the poster is written (translated): “The greatest axis of evil: USA and Israel.” Among the slogans repeatedly shouted were: “Død over jødene!” meaning: “Death to the Jews!” If Halvorsen had disagreed with such a view, she would have left the scene in protest. But she did not; despite her high position. She stayed on, and thus acted as a kind of “ambassador” for this horrible view. Halvorsen is guilty as charged!

Still, there are signs that plausibly show that the tide is about to turn in Norway. The violent demonstrations in Oslo, followed by unabashed demands by radical elements in the Muslim community (halal food in supermarkets and for all prisoners whether they are Muslims or not, use of hijab in the police force, the removal of freedom of speech in religious matters) seems to, at least to some degree, have awakened the people. Many Norwegians are starting to realize what Islam really is (at least its radical version), and that the problems are mounting up on their own doorstep, not just in faraway countries.

This new trend is indicated by that fact that after the leader of the Progressive Party (Siv Jensen) openly showed her and her party’s support to Israel, AND strongly opposed the above mentioned demands from radical Muslims and socialists, polls have dramatically increased the support to Progressive Party. Also opinion building via Internet and blogging is on the rise. A new arena not controlled by socialist journalists.

Best regards

Bent (Oslo, Norway)

See also in this blog: Anti-Semitism in Norway
Anti-Semitism in Norway - 2

Anti-Semitism in Norway

Ever since during the Israel-Lebanon conflict in 2006 the Norwegian novelist and intellectual Jostein Gaarder published an op-ed essay in the Norwegian daily newspaper Aftenposten in which he condemned certain aspects of Judaism and Israeli politics, and argued that the state of Israel should not be recognized in its present form, there has been a steady rise in anti-Semitic feeling throughout Norway. Although the currents of anti-Semitism were already present in Norwegian society, the publication of Gaarder's article seemed to have a profound effect on public opinion in the country, reinforcing old prejudices and stereotypes.

In his essay, translated here by a blogger, Gaarder wrote that

the state of Israel, with its unscrupulous art of war and its disgusting weapons, has massacred its own legitimacy. It has systematically flouted International Law, international conventions, and countless UN resolutions, and it can no longer expect protection from same. It has carpet bombed the recognition of the world. But fear not! The time of trouble shall soon be over. The state of Israel has seen its Soweto.

We are now at the watershed. There is no turning back. The state of Israel has raped the recognition of the world and shall have no peace until it lays down its arms.

And also:

We do not believe in the notion of God's chosen people. We laugh at this people's fancies and weep over its misdeeds. To act as God's chosen people is not only stupid and arrogant, but a crime against humanity. We call it racism.

Despite protestations that his statements were aimed at a state and not at a people, and that he did not want Israelis to suffer retribution, Gaarder provoked outrage in many parts of the world.

Today, the Jerusalem Post reports on a disturbing continuation of the increase in anti-Semitism in Norway -- a trend that was further aggravated by the Gaza conflict. In one comment, Dr Manfred Gerstenfeld, chairman of the Jerusalem Centre of Public Affairs, notes that

"the [Norwegian] elite, the academics, politicians and media consider themselves to be great moralists, with very little self-introspection. Their self-righteousness, arrogance, and inherited Lutheran prejudices against Jews has led to a huge amount of anti-Israel sentiment. Gaza caused these latent feelings in society to come to the fore."

Update:The Jerusalem Post has now removed Maya Spitzer's article from its website following a large number of protests, apparently from Norwegian-American readers. The author has stood by her report, and we are still linking to the article via Tundra Tabloids. We'll continue to watch developments.

For a further update, see also in this blog: Anti-Semitism in Norway - 2

Jon Fosse - "Morgon og kveld"

Norwegian playwright and novelist Jon Fosse will be 50 this year. He is one of the more visible writers in Norway, and acclaimed internationally as a playwright.

His short poetic novel from 2000 is called Morgon og kveld (Morn and Eve) and is gently experimental. It tells, in two parts, of the birth and the dying days of the protagonist, a fisherman. The first part, told by a third-person narrator, forms one seventh of the 116-page novel, and describes how the father, Olai, is waiting around rather helplessly as the old midwife Anna helps his wife Marta to give birth to his son Johannes. This son's mid-life is passed over, and when we meet Johannes again, he himself is the narrator, so the novel ends in mid-sentence.

In her review, critic Anne Lise Jomisko notes various things about this novel. Firstly that there are no full-stops in the whole book. Secondly that many descriptions are of daily routines. And that there are repetitions, as the reader can see from the excerpt below. This is a way of writing a novel that brings to the fore the words, the writing, as much as the plot or storyline.

The excerpt from the start of the novel shows the main two styles of the novel: short and pithy dialogue, and long stream of consciousness passages. The whole of the last paragraph here, for instance, continues and takes up pages 9-17 of the novel. This is still a draft; some of the shifting of tenses in the long passages are a challenge to the translator.

Morgon og kveld (Morn and Eve)

by Jon Fosse

More hot water, says the old midwife Anna

No, don’t stand there hanging around in the kitchen doorway, man, she says

No, no, says Olai

and he feels heat and cold spreading across his skin among the goose pimples and a joy goes right through him and emerges as tears in his eyes as he rushes off to the stove and starts to ladle steaming water into a long wooden bowl so that there will be enough, yes, thinks Olai and he ladles even more water into the bowl and he can hear the midwife Anna saying that there must be enough now, that’ll be enough now, she says and Olai looks up and there the old midwife Anna is, standing behind him and she picks up the bowl

I can carry it myself, says midwife Anna

and a muffled shriek can be heard form the room and Olai looks old midwife Anna in the eye and nods and even gives a big grin as he stands there

Be patient, will you, says the old midwife Anna

If it’s a boy, he’ll be called Johannes says Olai

We’ll have to see, says midwife Anna

Johannes, yes, says Olai

After my father, he says

No, there’s nothing wrong with that name, says the old midwife Anna
and another shriek, louder, freer now

Be patient, will you, Olai, says the old midwife Anna

Be patient, she says

Do you hear what I say? she says

Be patient, she says

You’re a fisherman, you know that there must be any women on board, don’t you? she says

Yes, yes, says Olai

And maybe it’s the same with men, you know what I’m getting at? says the old midwife Anna

Yes, a mishap, says Olai

Yes exactly, a mishap, says the old midwife Anna

and Olai sees the old midwife Anna go straight towards the door to the room holding the bowl of hot water in front of her, arms straight, and the old midwife Anna stops in the doorway and turns round towards Olai

Don’t just stand there, says the old midwife Anna

and Olai gives a start, is he standing there and unintentionally spreading mishap? no he didn’t mean to do so and if things go wrong with both loving and honouring Marta, his darling, his wife, then they will, no I can’t happen like that

You, Olai, leave the kitchen door alone and go and sit down on your chair, says the old midwife Anna

and Olai sits down at the end of the kitchen table and places his elbows on the table and rests his head in his hands and it was a good thing he’d taken Magda to his brother’s that day, thinks Olai, and when he was on his way to fetch the old midwife Anna, he first rowed over to his brother’s with Magda and didn’t know if he’d done the right thing, because Magda will soon be a grown up woman, Magda as well, the years pass quickly, but Marta asked him to do so, when she was about to give birth and he was to row out to fetch the old midwife Anna and must take Magda with him, so she could be at his brother’s while the birth took place, she was too young to know exactly what was awaiting her as adult woman, is what Marta had said to him and he had obviously to do what she said, even though he would so gladly have had Magda at his side right now, she’d been a clever and sensible girl as long as he could remember and good at everything she does, I’ve certainly got a good daughter, thinks Olai, but it didn’t look as if the Lord God would bless you with more children and the years passed by and after you had resigned yourself to the fact that there were not going to be more children, that’s how it was, that was their fate they said and they should thank the Lord their God as he had given them Magda, for if they hadn’t have had her, then it would have been sad for them here on Holmen where they had settled and where he himself had built the house and his brothers and neighbours had helped but he’d done most of the work himself and when he was courting Marta he had bought Holmen, which was going for a song and he’d thought it all out, where his home would be built, in a calm spot in the lee for wind and weather, and where it would stand, and he’d also thought about where the boathouse and the jetty would be, but it didn’t end up there, and the first he built was the jetty and built it in a quiet bay turned in towards the land, well in the lee for wind and weather there on the west side of Holmen, yes, and then the house itself got built, not so big and beautiful perhaps, and now Marta was lying there in the little room and would at last give birth to a son, now little Johannes was going to be born, he was sure of that, thought Olai as he sat there at the kitchen table, on his chair, and rested his head in his hands, as long as things didn’t go wrong, as long as Marta gave birth to the child, as long as little Johannes was alright in her belly and as long as both Marta and little Johannes can stand the pain, as long as it didn’t go with Marta like on that terrible day with his mother, no, he couldn’t bear the thought, thinks Olai, because they’ve had a good time together, Olai and Marta, love at first sight, thinks Olai, but now? will Marta be taken away from him? is God so angry with him? alright if He wants to, but it’s just as likely to be Satan who rules this world as it is the good Lord, Olai had never had any doubts about that

*

Translated from Norwegian (nynorsk) by Eric Dickens

Norway translation seminar

Via NORLA:

24-26 May NORLA is arranging a translation seminar for invited translators from all over the world. The seminar is financially supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which is concerned with the promotion of Norwegian literature abroad in general, as well as the translators' work in particular. Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Støre will attend the seminar opening.

Detective Story

The story of how Scandinavian crime novels became the leading literary export of the Nordic countries, and the mainstay of Anglo-American Nordic literary translators, is a fairly lengthy one. In some ways it's rather a sad story - as though modern English literature had suddenly become known to the world not through the books of D.H. Lawrence, Evelyn Waugh, Virginia Woolf, Aldous Huxley, George Orwell, Graham Greene and the rest, but rather through the novels of Agatha Christie.

In the 1960s and 70s, Scandinavian crime fiction was mainly familiar to the world's reading public in the form of the Martin Beck novels of the Swedish husband and wife team of Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö. In the late 1970s, some Nordic countries, notably Norway, began to make a serious push for recogition and acceptance of their literature and culture in the outside world. The push was government-subsidized, and in Norway, at any rate, considerable effort was invested in drawing the attention of overseas translators and publishers to the extremely active, though somewhat introverted, Norwegian literary scene. Elaborate seminars and conferences were held, and although these involved representatives from several European countries, it was contacts with British and American publishers and translators that were given special priority. In the early 1980s, much of the Norwegian fiction published in English translation was of the "serious" kind, with a special focus on contemporary women's writing: the work of Herbjørg Wassmo,Cecilie Løveid and Bjørg Vik began to be translated and published in Britain and the U.S. at this time. In particular, the smaller U.K. publishers, like Virago, the Women's Press and Quartet Books played a central role in this process, and it was thought that books which focused on women's issues stood the greatest chance of being sold.

In the mid-1980s the attention of some British publishers, including Allison & Busby, Quartet and the newly formed Serpent's Tail, began to drift towards the possibility that Scandinavian crime fiction might offer a saleable alternative or adjunct to Nordic women's writing. In 1986 I translated for the Quartet Qrime series Gunnar Staalesen's bleak Varg Veum thriller I mørket er alle ulver grå (1983), which is set in Bergen and is built around the ramifications of the post-Nazi era in Norway. As At Night All Wolves Are Grey (1986) it was favourably reviewed, and began to sell a reasonable number of copies. Word of this got out onto the grapevine, and other UK publishers began to show an interest in Nordic crime writing. It was, however, the advent of the Danish writer Peter Høeg's Frøken Smillas fornemmelse for sne (1992), published in the US by Farrar Straus as Smilla's Sense of Snow (1993) and in the UK by Harvill Press as Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow (1993), which really projected Nordic crime fiction into the realm of international bestsellers.

From then on, the world's English-language publishers began to view Scandinavia as the home of crime fiction, in the sense that Britain once was. Interest in the work of Nordic writers who did not adopt the genre began to fall, and among writers of fiction in the Nordic countries themselves there was a growing tendency to to employ the techniques of crime writing in novels and narratives that were not really detective stories at all, in the hope that this might increase the likelihood that their books would receive attention abroad.

It's in contemporary Swedish fiction that the results of this trend have been most marked. In the crime novels of authors like Henning Mankell - whose Wallander series is now a BBC television show - "serious" concerns are blended with entertainment in a formula that is now almost standard for Swedish authors who want to be taken seriously at an international level. As John Crace noted recently about the novels of Mankell and others,

Their leading characters tend to be depressed melancholics with or without a drinking problem, while having a strong sense of Guardianista political correctness.

This combination of crime plots and "leftish" sermonizing appears to be the new orthodoxy on the Nordic literary scene. And it's the one that translators are liable to become involved in, willingly or not, as - to put it crudely - that is where the jobs are. It seems a pity that so much interesting and experimental writing from Sweden and the other Nordic countries is going relatively unnoticed as a result (the work of the iconoclastic Swedish novelist Sara Stridsberg is one prominent example). Meanwhile, as Håkan Nesser prepares to address the spring meeting of SELTA in London next week, one must hope that the present developments are merely a passing fad or fashion, and that in time the balance in translated Nordic fiction between entertainment and the vital concerns of new writing will be restored to something of the status it enjoyed in the early 1980s once again.