The World's Best Untranslated Novels

I’m not sure these are the absolute best, but New York polled a number of experts and came up with a list of recommended titles from around the world that have yet to appear in English.

Some of the recommended books include Daniel Sada’s Porque Parece Mentira la Verdad Nunca Se Sabe, which is a title I’ve been interested in for a while. And according to Francisco Goldman, Sada was the “contemporary Mexican novelist Roberto Bolaño most admired.”

Martin Gambarrota of the Buenos Aires Herald praised Marcelo Cohen, calling him “arguably Argentina’s most established novelist at the moment. His books read like Kafka on the brink of turning into science fiction.”

Norman Manea recommends Gabriela Adamesteanu’s Provizoriu, and Dedi Felman, editor for Simon & Schuster and Words Without Borders, compares Norwegian author Johan Harstad to Jonathan Safran Foer for his combination of “formal play and linguistic ferocity with a searing emotional directness.”

The whole list is worth checking out, although I wish there were links to the books and translated excerpts of the books.

It’s also funny that this article is in response to the fact that the world’s “gone gaga for Roberto Bolaño this summer.” Could it happen? Could one superstar in translation serve as a gateway drug to getting publishers and readers to publish and read more translations? Probably not, but it’s pretty to think so.