Unlike you, I only manage to get through a book per month despite my best efforts. But unlike you (this year), most of them were translations. Looking back over the year, the translations were from (in order): Russian, Bulgarian, Russian (Ukrainian author), French, Czech, French, English, Lithuanian, Spanish, German, Albanian, Russian.
The English novel was Forster's Maurice, which, being written in 1913-14, was so full of Oxford student slang from that time and items/conventions that no longer exist that it could have used a translation! Weirdly I've never had that issue with other books from that time or earlier, but for some reason in Maurice it really stood out. (which Forster kind of admits in a commentary. I don't have it in front of me, but I believe he said something about it being almost immediately outdated, since the world changed so quickly right after he wrote it)
I admire you for reading so many works in translation! I'm about to finish an African novel that I hope to add to my Best Fiction 2024 list, so take a look in a day or two.
I didn't read Maurice, but I enjoyed the movie. And we haven't even talked about movies yet! More to come. Always great hearing from you!
Unlike you, I only manage to get through a book per month despite my best efforts. But unlike you (this year), most of them were translations. Looking back over the year, the translations were from (in order): Russian, Bulgarian, Russian (Ukrainian author), French, Czech, French, English, Lithuanian, Spanish, German, Albanian, Russian.
The English novel was Forster's Maurice, which, being written in 1913-14, was so full of Oxford student slang from that time and items/conventions that no longer exist that it could have used a translation! Weirdly I've never had that issue with other books from that time or earlier, but for some reason in Maurice it really stood out. (which Forster kind of admits in a commentary. I don't have it in front of me, but I believe he said something about it being almost immediately outdated, since the world changed so quickly right after he wrote it)
I admire you for reading so many works in translation! I'm about to finish an African novel that I hope to add to my Best Fiction 2024 list, so take a look in a day or two.
I didn't read Maurice, but I enjoyed the movie. And we haven't even talked about movies yet! More to come. Always great hearing from you!