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Value & Controversy

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post on Vernon Subutex I by Virginie Despentes, translated by Frank Wynne, and Sympathy for the Translator by Mark Polizzotti in which I teased a future post (this one!) in which the "value" and "controversy" terms would be inverted: the nonfiction book from the translator would supply the heat, ...

“Chasing the King of Hearts” by Hanna Krall [Why This Book Should Win]

This entry in the Why This Book Should Win series is from Ruchama Johnston-Bloom, who writes about modern Jewish thought and Orientalism. She has a PhD in the History of Judaism from the University of Chicago and is the Associate Director of Academic Affairs at the London center of CAPA: The Global Education ...

Why This Book Should Win: "The Hunger Angel" by Herta Müller [BTBA 2013]

As in years past, we will be highlighting all 25 titles on the BTBA Fiction Longlist, one by one, building up to the announcement of the 10 finalists on April 10th. A variety of judges, booksellers, and readers will write these, all under the rubric of “Why This Book Should Win. You can find the whole series by clicking ...

Interview with Philip Boehm [Read This Next]

For those who didn’t get enough from the other week’s Read This Next on Gregor von Rezzori’s An Ermine of Czernopol, we’ve added an interview with the translator, Philip Boehm. Here’s a little excerpt: Lily Ye: What did you think of the way in which Rezzori is able to voice different ...

The Ermine of Czernopol

The Ermine of Czernopol is the first of Gregor von Rezzori’s semi-autobiographical novels about growing up in what was Austria-Hungary. In it, childhood is the conduit through which we must understand everything. The thing about a being a child is an unorthodox and oftentimes uncanny mode of perception, due to the foreign ...

Latest Review: "The Ermine in Czernopol" by Gregor Von Rezzori

The latest addition to our Reviews Section is a piece by Lily Ye on this week’s Read This Next book, The Ermine in Czernopol by Gregor Von Rezzori. This novel is translated by Philip Boehm and forthcoming from New York Review Books. This is the first book in the Von Rezzori trilogy, which also includes The Snows of ...

The Ermine of Czernopol by Gregor Von Rezzori [Read This Next]

This week’s Read This Next selection is The Ermine of Czernopol, the first in a trilogy of semi-autobiographical works by Gregor von Rezzori (The Snows of Yesteryear, Memoirs of an Anti-Semite), all of which are available from New York Review Books. We chose this book because of its unique and revealing perspective: von ...