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Leaflet
Go*Dutch! continues with a short series of events at the Free Word Centre in London.
For these events we have made a leaflet which you can download by clicking on this link.
Tommy Wieringa and Otto de Kat at the Essex Book Festival
Tommy Wieringa and Otto de Kat were interviewed by the BBC at the Essex Book Festival.
Q&A with Cynthia Mc Leod in the Big Issue
In the 23-29 november issue of the Big Issue Cynthia Mc Leod is interviewed by Kevin Gopal. You can read it here (.pdf).
Publishers Go Dutch! to champion new writing from the Netherlands
PRESS RELEASE - Go Dutch!, a major new campaign to raise awareness of Dutch literature in translation has been launched with the backing of a number of UK publishers and Arts Council England.
Developed by the Amsterdam-based Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature (NLPVF) and Midland Creative Projects (based in Birmingham), the initiative aims to raise the profile of individual contemporary Dutch writers and their books in the UK, as well as drawing attention to Dutch literature as a whole.
Working with a number of publishers including Harvill Secker, Portobello and Arcadia Books, Go Dutch! will highlight the work of eight authors all of whom are bestsellers in their native country.
Between now and spring 2010 all the authors will be visiting the UK to take part in literary events around the country including festivals in Liverpool, Manchester, Durham, Ilkley, Birmingham and Essex. Some will be working directly with young British writers, for example with the Writing Squad in Yorkshire and on the University of Warwick’s Writing Programme. A taste of the authors’ writing will be showcased in a hundred-page sampler to be distributed up and down the country via readers’ groups, libraries, literary festivals and a selection of independent bookshops.
Mireille Berman, Head of International Literary Projects at the NLPVF said:
“The Netherlands is blessed with many wonderful writers, and we are delighted to see that so many British publishers have spotted and are supporting such talent by publishing translations of their work. It shows that there is an appetite for these books. However we felt it might be difficult for the publishers to draw attention to these individual Dutch writers in an already crowded book market. It was at this point that the idea of the Go Dutch! project came about; by collectively raising awareness of these authors, we will give many UK readers the opportunity to meet and read the work of some of our country’s finest contemporary writers.”
Philip Gwyn Jones of Portobello Books, publisher of the novelist Tommy Wieringa, said of the initiative:
“One of Portobello Books’ founding principles was a belief in the power of good stories to travel - and a commitment to seeking out the most indelible, vital and beguiling storytellers from all quarters of the world to bring back for our readers. It’s easier for words to travel, than for writers, so any initiative that enables English-speaking readers to meet writers from other lands is to be wholly welcomed. We are very grateful for the Go Dutch! project’s invaluable support of the terrific Tommy Wieringa and his first novel to be translated into English, Joe Speedboat. We hope the initiative will bring the UK recognition very much deserved for all of the eight writers involved.”
Prize-winning author Otto de Kat praised the project:
“Britain is the homeland of fiction, so for a Dutch author it’s of the utmost significance to be published in the English language. It’s wonderful to be welcomed by publishers, booksellers, critics and readers, and I do hope we can show them that there is something going on in the provinces of literature outside their splendid island!”
Anna Dreda of Wenlock Books, Shropshire, who will be distributing the samplers to her customers, explained why she’s supporting the campaign:
“Finding exciting new writers is always the dream and challenge of good bookselling and to find good work in translation is particularly rewarding. These contemporary Dutch writers are unknown in the UK - and that is our loss as well as theirs. As an independent bookseller I am so pleased to be able to bring new writers from other cultures to the heart of our reading lives by supporting Go Dutch!”
List of authors and titles
The full list of authors and titles involved in the project is as follows:
- Amuse-Bouche by Arnon Grunberg - Comma Press
- Man on the Move by Otto de Kat - MacLehose Press
- People Like Us - The Truth About Reporting the Middle East by Joris Luyendijk - Reportage Press
- An Island in Time; In Europe; and The Bridge by Geert Mak - Vintage
- The Free Negress Elisabeth by Cynthia Mc Leod - Arcadia Books
- About Love and Nothing Else; and The Squirrel’s Birthday and Other Parties by Toon Tellegen - Shoestring Press and Boxer Books
- Engineers of the Soul; and Ararat by Frank Westerman - Harvill Secker/Vintage
- Joe Speedboat by Tommy Wieringa - Portobello
For further information or to request samplers / review copies contact: Preena Gadher on 020 3174 0118 / 07833 431119 or preena@riotcommunications.com.
—ENDS—
Notes to editors
The Foundation for the Promotion and Translation of Dutch Literature (NLPVF) The NLPVF exists to promote interest in Dutch-language literature abroad. It maintains contacts with a large number of international publishers, and has a stand at major international book fairs, including the Frankfurt Book Fair, the London Book Fair and the Children’s Book Fair in Bologna.
Midland Creative Projects
Midland Creative Projects is an independent agency working in the creative arts sector, specialising in literature activities. It currently manages the Birmingham Book Festival, the West Midlands Readers’ Network and Go Dutch! amongst other projects. www.midlandcreative.co.uk
About the authors:
Arnon Grunberg is the author of a collection of short stories entitled Amuse-Bouche, translated by Ron de Klerk & Lisa Friedman, and published by Comma Press. It is out now. Grunberg was born in 1971 and is one of the Netherlands’ most prolific and acclaimed writers. His first novel, Blue Mondays was published in 1994 when Grunberg was just 23. It was an instant success and he has since written numerous novels, plays, essays and travel columns. His work has been translated into twenty-one languages. Grunberg is a popular columnist for various Dutch newspapers and magazines and writes a blog for the literary online magazine Words without Borders. He lives in New York.
Otto de Kat is the author of Man on the Move, translated by Sam Garrett, and published by MacLehose Press. It has just been published.
Otto de Kat is the pen name of Jan Geurt Gaarlandt, born in Rotterdam in 1946. He is a former publisher and his first novel was published in 1998 and appeared in English translation in the UK as The Figure in the Distance (Harvill Press, 2002). His second novel, Man on the Move, was originally published in 2004 and was met with equally great critical acclaim. He is the winner of several prestigious prizes including Holland’s Halewijn prize.
Joris Luyendijk is the author of People Like Us - The Truth About Reporting the Middle East, translated by Michele Hutchison, and published by Reportage Press. It will be published this autumn.
Luyendijk was born in 1971 and studied Anthropology and Arabic at the Universities of Kansas, Amsterdam and Cairo. He was editor-in-chief of Move Your World Magazine, a publication about young people and development cooperation. Between 1998 and 2003 he lived in Cairo, then Beirut and finally East Jerusalem, working for the newspapers de Volkskrant and NRC Handelsblad as well as for Dutch radio and television. His book, People Like Us, has sold over a quarter of a million copies in the Netherlands. In 2002 he was awarded the Golden Pen, a prestigious Dutch prize for journalism. He lives in Amsterdam.
Geert Mak is the author of three non-fiction titles in English all translated by Sam Garrett: In Europe and The Bridge are out now; and An Island in Time will be published in autumn 2010, all by Harvill Secker/Vintage.
Mak is one of the most successful writers in Netherlands. All his works have been published to huge critical and popular acclaim; The Sunday Times hailed In Europe: Travels Through the Twentieth Century as “spectacular and beautifully crafted”. Last year, he was the winner of the prestigious German Leipziger Buchpreis, a prize awarded to an author whose work encourages dialogue between countries and citizens in Europe.
Cynthia McLeod is the bestselling author of The Free Negress Elisabeth, a novel translated by Brain Doyle and published by Arcadia. It is out now.
McLeod was born in 1936 in Paramaribo, Suriname. She is the daughter of Johan Ferrier, the last governor and first president of Suriname. In 1995, her debut novel How Much Was the Sugar? made McLeod and overnight sensation and remains a bestseller. She went on to publish several more works including The Free Negress Elisabeth in which she invested twelve years of historical research. McLeod is widely regarded as one of the leading authorities on Surinamese history.
Toon Tellegen is the author of a collection of poems called About Love and Nothing Else, translated by Judith Wilkinson, and published by Shoestring Press. It is out now. He is also the author of The Squirrel’s Birthday and Other Parties and Letters to Anyone and Everyone, children’s books translated by Martin Cleaver, illustrated by Jessica Ahlberg, and published by Boxer Books on 3rd September.
Tellegen is one of the Netherlands’ most celebrated writers. His animal stories have been translated into nineteen languages and are loved by children and parents the world over. As a poet, he is one of Holland’s finest, and he is increasingly gaining an international readership for his poetry. He lives in Amsterdam.
Frank Westerman is the author of Engineers of the Soul, to be published in hardback in May 2010 and Ararat to be published in paperback in May 2010, both translated by Sam Garrett, and published by Harvill Secker. Bestselling writer Westerman was born in 1964 and is the author of five books. His work has been published in more than ten languages and he is the recipient of two major literary prizes in the Netherlands. Ararat is his latest book. He lives in Amsterdam.
Tommy Wieringa is the author of Joe Speedboat, a novel translated by Sam Garrett and published by Portobello Books. It has just been published.
Wieringa was born in 1967 and grew up partly in the Netherlands, partly in the tropics. He began his writing career with travel stories and journalism and is the author of two previous novels, one of which was awarded Holland’s Halewijn prize and nominated for the AKO Literature Prize. Joe Speedboat has sold over 300,000 copies in its Dutch original and is the first of his books to be translated into English. It is also being translated into over a dozen other languages, and will shortly be made into a film.
Sampler GO*DUTCH!
A taste of the authors’ writing will be showcased in a hundred-page sampler to be distributed up and down the country via readers’ groups, libraries, literary festivals and a selection of independent bookshops. GO*DUTCH! is an introduction to eight writers whose work represents the extraordinary range of literature being translated from Dutch.
Some of these names may be familiar to readers in the UK. Geert Mak’s majestic journey through twentieth century Europe is already an established classic, and Frank Westerman’s exploration of his own journey to Mount Ararat has been well received. Other names, including Toon Tellegen, Tommy Wieringa, Arnon Grunberg, Otto de Kat, Cynthia Mc Leod and Joris Luyendijk are less familiar, but no less approachable.
Perhaps because the Netherlands share so many characteristics with the UK, literature in Dutch has many parallels. The post-colonial experience is central to the work of Cynthia Mc Leod (who lives in Suriname, the former Dutch colony in South America), while a rites ritesof- passage to adulthood is the focus of Tommy Wieringa’s novel, Joe Speedboat. Joris Luyendijk’s book, People Like Us - The Truth About Reporting The Middle East, explores the relationship between Islam and the West. All these are subjects shared with UK writers.
Personal experience as a basis for deeply considered books on contemporary history and politics is a characteristic of many Dutch writers. Another is a gift for narrative - whether it be of wartime travels around the globe as in Otto de Kat’s Man on the Move, Arnon Grunberg’s playful and beguiling stories of modern life or the stories of Toon Tellegen, loved by adult readers as much as by the children for whom they were written.
None of this writing would reach readers in the UK without the inspired work of their translators, including Sam Garrett, Michele Hutchison, Brian Doyle, Lisa Friedman and Ron de Klerk, Judith Wilkinson and Martin Cleaver. Go Dutch! is supported by the publishers Arcadia Books, Boxer Books, Comma Press, Harvill Secker, Portobello, MacLehose Press, Reportage Press and Shoestring Press. We are grateful for the support of Arts Council England and the Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature.
By Jonathan Davidson