{"id":307726,"date":"2018-02-05T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-02-05T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wdev.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent-dev\/2018\/02\/05\/never-fact-check-a-listicle\/"},"modified":"2018-07-21T10:47:13","modified_gmt":"2018-07-21T14:47:13","slug":"never-fact-check-a-listicle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/2018\/02\/05\/never-fact-check-a-listicle\/","title":{"rendered":"Never Fact-Check a Listicle"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back when I kicked off my 2018 Translations series<\/a> I chose to include Frankenstein in Baghdad<\/em> by Ahmed Saadawi as the fourth book from January I would read and review. And why not? It won the 2014 International Prize for Arabic Fiction1<\/a><\/sup> and came with pretty high praise.<\/p>\n

\u201cA haunting allegory of man\u2019s savagery against man and one of the most essential books to come out of the Iraq War, or any war.\u201d\u2014Elliot Ackerman, National Book Award finalist for Dark at the Crossing<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

I actually don\u2019t know Eliot Ackerman\u2019s work, but his brother is a wrestler,<\/a> although the real kind, not the fun WWE<\/span> kind. Regardless, this book is \u201cone of the most essential\u201d and I\u2019d like to think that I read some essential books.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn extraordinary piece of work. With uncompromising focus, Ahmed Saadawi takes you right to the wounded heart of war\u2019s absurd and tragic wreckage. It is a devastating but essential read, one that I am sure I will return to again and again.\u201d\u2014Kevin Powers, bestselling author and National Book Award finalist for The Yellow Birds<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

I do know Kevin Powers though and . . . wait. There\u2019s a trend developing here. Two National Book Award finalists who both<\/em> think the book is \u201cessential\u201d? What are the odds? That\u2019s weird.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrilliant and horrifying, Frankenstein in Baghdad<\/em> is essential reading.\u201d\u2014Rachel Cordasco, World Literature Today<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Trifecta! This book is essential.<\/em> All I can glean from this is that one day Rachel2<\/a><\/sup> will be a finalist for the National Book Award. (Get writing, Rachel!)<\/p>\n

One more:<\/p>\n

\u201cGripping, darkly humorous . . . profound.\u201d\u2014Phil Klay, bestselling author and National Book Award winner for Redeployment<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Lesson #2: If you win<\/em> a National Book Award, you don\u2019t have to say a book is essential<\/em>.<\/p>\n

(Bonus points to The National<\/em> for using a thesaurus: \u201cTells a vital<\/em> story.\u201d)<\/p>\n

But what makes a book \u201cessential\u201d? Can a book even be \u201cessential\u201d? What does that mean? It\u2019s just not possible for a book\u2014any book\u2014to be urgent, necessary, or luminous. I just listed the three jacket copy\/blurb words that drive Coffee House\u2019s Caroline Casey insane. There\u2019s a podcast from some years back where she loses her shit about this. \u201cBooks do not<\/em> give off light!\u201d<\/p>\n

And she\u2019s right. The usage of these words in blurb speak is fairly lazy and basically a non-signifier. Show me a book that\u2019s essential<\/em> to living and I\u2019ll show you 100 million people who don\u2019t read. It\u2019s especially odd that Penguin used two blurbs postulating this same imaginary world on the back cover.<\/p>\n

The other blurbs\u2014not necessarily worth repeating here\u2014also have a lot in common: \u201cA haunting allegory,\u201d \u201chorrifically funny and allegorically resonant,\u201d \u201ca haunting allegory,\u201d \u201cthis haunting novel,\u201d \u201ca haunting and startling mix of horror,\u201d \u201cdarkly humorous,\u201d \u201cfunny and horrifying,\u201d \u201cstay for the dark humor,\u201d and \u201ctouches of black comedy.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m glad I read this essential allegory of darkly comic horror!<\/p>\n

*<\/center>I have to be honest: I had the hardest time paying attention to this book. Because of my insane number of reading obligations (reading for my World Literature & Translation class, for the PEN<\/span> Center Translation Prize, for the Irish Trip I\u2019m leading for the University of Rochester, for Open Letter\u2019s fall catalog, for this 2018 translation project), I ended up finishing fifteen books in January. Or, depending on what kind of stickler you are, \u201cfinished\u201d fifteen books. Two of those\u2014In the Woods<\/i> by Tana French and Frankenstein in Baghdad<\/em> I actually listened to on audiobook.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been an audiobook devotee for years now. Ever since I admitted to myself that I am never<\/em> going to make enough time to read all the random books that sound interesting, but which aren\u2019t essential<\/em> to my career or life. Books like The Luminaries<\/em> or A Brief History of Seven Killings<\/em>, two audiobooks I totally loved.<\/p>\n

Sometimes audiobooks are just flat out entertaining\u2014like Seven Killings<\/em>, which is as much an audio performance as anything else\u2014and other times, they\u2019re just totally function. A sort of life hack to getting things finished and off the \u201cto read\u201d shelf. If I only listened to these on my bike rides to and from work, I would finish a 250-page book every week. That\u2019s not bad!<\/p>\n

To be honest, I usually listen to these at the gym . . . with the Kindle version in front of me. That\u2019s totally overkill, but for some of these books, it\u2019s essential<\/em> that I have both to really be able to get into the text. Besides, running on a treadmill is boring as fuck. Having someone read in my ear while glancing at words on a page, or touch-flipping a page, is literally 400% more engaging than running.<\/p>\n

So I listened to Frankenstein in Baghdad.<\/em> But since I try not to give my money to corporations like Penguin Random House (which makes such<\/em> a difference), this time I didn\u2019t get the Kindle version. For whatever reason, this totally wrecked my ability to really comprehend this book. Not that I couldn\u2019t follow the plot\u2014which isn\u2019t all that complicated, really, given that most of it is in the title and those essential<\/i> blurbs\u2014but that I kept drifting off due to all the descriptive bits that, to me as a reader, seemed unnecessary.<\/p>\n

Even before he spoke I had made up my mind to buy the recorder, not because I needed it but as a kind of charity. I was even more resolved when I heard he had large debts and needed to pay them off before going back to his family in Maysan Province. But I didn\u2019t expect to buy a story or pay four hundred dollars. I couldn\u2019t pay such an amount on short notice.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Perfectly normal paragraph. One that you can more or less skim when you\u2019re reading. \u201cMade up mind to buy the recorder . . . more resolved, large debt . . . can\u2019t pay on short notice.\u201d Got it. Good.<\/p>\n

Is there anything else in there that truly adds<\/em> to the style or story? Not really. some details, but nothing that\u2019s written in such a striking manner as to hold your attention.<\/em> Nothing essential<\/em> anyway.<\/p>\n

The thing about listening to audiobooks though is that they\u2019re so slow.<\/em> Whatever you can read in a minute takes about two-and-a-half when read out loud. That can really strain your attention if most of what\u2019s being read is superfluous information related in a fairly flat style. And for this book, I just couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

By contrast, I\u2019m not listening to A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing<\/em> and am locked into it 100%. And in December, Dhalgren<\/em> kept me captivated for all 38 hours (or so). For me, style is an absolute key to being able to pay attention. Books that ride on accurately relating extraneous information are ones that I should read with my eyes, skimming the meh parts.<\/p>\n

*<\/center>Last week, the National Book Foundation announced their relaunch of the National Book Award for Translations. I have a lot of thoughts about this\u2014all of which I\u2019ll save for tomorrow\u2019s February Translation Preview. (Stay tuned! That post is FIRE<\/span>.) And because there\u2019s not a cultural event out there that sites like LitHub can\u2019t jam a listicle into, they posted this listicle: The Year\u2019s 10 Best Reviewed Books in Translation.<\/a><\/p>\n

Where to start! There\u2019s so much here that\u2019s right down the middle of the \u201cWhat Makes Chad Mad\u201d plate. I would bat .400 against this article. I\u2019m the Mike Trout of making fun of shit like this!<\/p>\n

Easy digs first: The tenth most reviewed book of 2017? Frankenstein of Baghdad<\/em>, which was released on January 23, 2018. Good work!<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s a nitpick. I mean, once upon a time Tilted Axis posted a list of four books in translation by women to read for Women in Translation month, but had to delete one when they realized the author was a man. Mistakes happen. Hell, look at every one of these<\/em> posts. (Although these aren\u2019t clickbait and clickbait is FAIR<\/span> GAME<\/span> for being called into question seeing as sites like LitHub and Buzzfeed and Flavorwire\u2014for all the good they do<\/em> do\u2014namely profit by strip mining culture and aggregating the work of others for their own benefit. This used to be called exploitation, but now it\u2019s called \u201cstrategic content reformulation.\u201d)<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more astonishing though is what made Frankenstein in Baghdad<\/em> 2017\u2019s tenth most reviewed book in translation.<\/p>\n

In case you\u2019re not a long-time reader or Three Percent Podcast listener, I should take a second to explain that this entire \u201cranking\u201d on LitHub is based on LitHub\u2019s Book Marks<\/a> project. A literary Rotten Tomatoes, this launched a couple years ago with the intent of pooling reviews, assigning them a grade (used to be a letter grade but now they just put them into very broad buckets), averaging them, and listing which books are the \u201cmost reviewed,\u201d \u201cbest reviewed,\u201d etc. It\u2019s a poor man\u2019s attempt at applying math to literature and pretending this has objective results.3<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

I wrote a very long chapter of a never-to-be-published book about poor Book Marks and all its problems, and Tom and I ripped it a few times on the podcast. But rather than start from a theoretical perspective of why this is an overall bad idea that rewards popularity over diversity (which, not surprising, given recent LitHub controversies, especially concerning Arabic literature) and is just an attempt to create more clicks for a clickbait website and more sales for The Big Five, let\u2019s get all empirical and look at the data.<\/p>\n

According to Book Marks (still one of the worst puns in the book world . . . see, the books are given \u201cmarks\u201d and \u201cbookmarks\u201d are a thing you put in books and denial aside MY GOD<\/span> do we live in an industry of lose-lose puns [redundant?]), Frankenstein in Baghdad<\/em> has received seven reviews. Seven?! That\u2019s interesting . . . Here\u2019s the list: NY Times<\/em> (rave), Booklist<\/em> (rave), Chicago Tribune<\/em> (mixed)4<\/a><\/sup>, Seattle Times<\/em> (rave), World Literature Today<\/em> (rave), Kirkus<\/em> (positive)5<\/a><\/sup>, and Publishers Weekly<\/em> (positive)6<\/a><\/sup>. That\u2019s it. Seven reviews makes your book the tenth most reviewed translation of 2017.<\/em> (Even though it came out in 2018, yes, I\u2019ll stop now.) The number one, most review book in translation<\/em> received fourteen.<\/p>\n

By contrast, fucking Maze Runner: Death Cure<\/em> has 132 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. One hundred and thirty-two. Compared to fourteen.<\/p>\n

What does that mean? Two things: That fourteen is a small sample size for judging anything, and that Book Marks is pretty constricted in where it\u2019s drawing its reviews from. There is a listing at the bottom of their \u201cHow It Works\u201d page of where LitHub pulls from to construct Book Marks, but the list does smack of exclusivity. But there are plenty of legitimate (\u201cindie\u201d?) review sites not<\/em> included (SPOILER<\/span>: Quarterly Conversation, The Complete Review, Music & Literature, Drunken Boat, Three Percent, and many many more, all of which review 20 times more translations a year than O: The Oprah Magazine<\/em>, but maybe we\u2019re\u2026not professional enough? Or experts about translation7<\/a><\/sup>?) all of which is just another sad-but-true indicator that, much like Trump\u2019s America, this industry also thrives on the rich getting richer and shaking each other\u2019s hands as they do.<\/p>\n

Example: The New York Times<\/em> reviews a lot of Penguin books. They just do. And these books are highlighted on the Book Marks website as the most reviewed (and best reviewed). Coupled with LitHub\u2019s spiderweb strategy of gobbling up all lit blog traffic for their own content, readers might actually be fooled into thinking this is some kind of democracy and buy into the narrative that the best new books are always<\/em> from the biggest presses, and why bother with anything else? Point being: as \u201cfun\u201d as listicles can be in a world more and more dependent on instant gratification, they\u2019re never really eligible for face-value or all-inclusive accuracy. Like all those cover blurbs at the beginning, the information in question is being curated in a way that, while some may see it as essential<\/em>, is in fact detrimental to the entire process. A monoculture thus does make.<\/p>\n

This idea is put in stark relief when you list the publishers of the most reviewed<\/em> translations of 20\u2014: New Directions (the<\/em> go-to press for translations among 99% of reviewers8<\/a><\/sup>), FSG<\/span>, Riverhead, FSG<\/span>, New Press (sort of surprised, but mostly because I found Black Moses<\/em> to be a really tedious book compared to Mabanckou\u2019s other works), New Directions, Knausgaard or I mean Penguin, Counterpoint, New Directions, Penguin. How many of these presses really do<\/em> translations? One. New Directions. The rest are dilettantes that leverage money and power for cultural goodwill. I\u2019m so glad LitHub can give them a pat on the back for their utter devotion<\/em> to bringing international voices to America!<\/p>\n

Another thing! If seven<\/em> reviews over all of 2018<\/del> 2017 is enough to be the tenth most reviewed translation<\/em> then translated literature has a serious problem. Or not? Most indie press buzz is from booksellers. Actual readers. The typical promotional structure is so removed<\/em> from the presses who invest the most intellectual capital into diversifying book culture. And LitHub is 100% reinforcing that structure with . . . well, their entire website. That\u2019s their actual M.O., which is clear as day if you pay attention or just look at this post in question.<\/p>\n

Wait. WAIT<\/span>. Why isn\u2019t Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions<\/em> by Valeria Luiselli NOT<\/span> on this list? It was reviewed in the New Yorker<\/em>, New York Times<\/em>, Kirkus<\/em>, NPR<\/span>, Publishers Weekly<\/em>, LITERARY<\/span> HUB<\/span><\/em>, Rolling Stone<\/em> (!!), New York Times Sunday Book Review<\/em>, GQ<\/em>, Chicago Tribune<\/em>, The Guardian<\/em>, Harper\u2019s<\/em>, The Nation<\/em>, Minnesota Public Radio (I\u2019m sure the NY-centric LitHub is . . . nevermind), Financial Times<\/em>, Vulture<\/em>, Vol. 1 Brooklyn<\/em>, Miami Rail<\/em>, Brooklyn Magazine<\/em>, Latin American Literature Today<\/em>, In These Times<\/em>, Times Literary Supplement<\/em>, The Intercept<\/em>, World Literature Today<\/em>, Remezcla<\/em>, The Millions<\/em>, Paste<\/em>, The Riveter<\/em>, Shondaland<\/em>, The Rumpus<\/em>, more LITERARY<\/span> HUB<\/span><\/em>, Dissent<\/em>, Writer\u2019s Bone<\/em>, Bookwitty<\/em>, Proximity Magazine<\/em>, Texas Observer<\/em>, Houston Chronicle<\/em>, In Order of Importance<\/em>, Ploughshares<\/em>, Signature<\/em>, THE<\/span> Magazine<\/em>, and Drunken Boat<\/em>. That\u2019s 1 . . . 2. . . . 7 . . . 14 . . . 41?! More than 14! So, why, again, isn\u2019t this book on the list? Even restricting it to LitHub Friendly sites, it\u2019s more than enough. Maybe there\u2019s a problem with the whole Book Marks system? SHOCKER<\/span>.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not done railing. Come back tomorrow for a February Translation Preview filled with fiery opinions, critical analysis of publishing economic structures, and jokes. Tell your friends. Don\u2019t let listicles get all the hits. Read different and think<\/em>.9<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

1<\/sup> One of the weirdest lines in the reviews for this book comes from Dwight Garner\u2019s piece in the New York Times<\/em>,<\/a> \u201cIt is no surprise to learn that he won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, a kind of Booker Prize for the region, for Frankenstein in Baghdad.<\/em>\u201d Let\u2019s not get into the question as to whether this is surprising or not\u2014which presuppossed a knowledge of \u201cthe region\u2019s\u201d books and what the award rewards and all of that\u2014but just look at that \u201ckind of Booker Prize\u201d bit. From Wikipedia: \u201cThe International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF<\/span>) (Arabic: \u0627\u0644\u062c\u0627\u0626\u0632\u0629 \u0627\u0644\u0639\u0627\u0644\u0645\u064a\u0629 \u0644\u0644\u0631\u0648\u0627\u064a\u0629 \u0627\u0644\u0639\u0631\u0628\u064a\u0629\u200e) is a literary prize managed in association with the Booker Prize Foundation in London, and supported by the Emirates Foundation in Abu Dhabi.\u201d Yeah, kind of like<\/em> a Booker Prize for the region. Or, simply, \u201cA Booker Prize for Arabic writing.\u201d<\/p>\n

2<\/sup> Full disclosure: Rachel is a friend and former guest on the Two Month Review<\/em> who blurbed Fres\u00e1n\u2019s The Bottom of the Sky.<\/em><\/p>\n

3<\/sup> Another disclosure: If there was a way of calculating wRC+ for books based on advance, marketing budget, sales, and cultural impact, I would probably love it.<\/p>\n

4<\/sup> This is what makes a review mixed: \u201cGiven these characters\u2019 remove from the Whatsitsname, it\u2019s difficult for them to captivate. Perhaps the reason for this owes something to the author\u2019s rather obvious pursuit of allegory.\u201d In other words, having a nuanced read is \u201cmixed.\u201d This is the ONLY<\/span> mixed review. All the others are \u201craves\u201d or \u201cpositive.\u201d If you don\u2019t<\/em> see a problem here, email me so that we can argue.<\/p>\n

5<\/sup> I can\u2019t distinguish between a \u201crave\u201d and a \u201cpositive review\u201d and I don\u2019t want to put more effort into this.<\/p>\n

6<\/sup> What does it mean that both \u201cpositive\u201d reviews are from the trade magazine (less influenced by buzz and advertising, the ones reviewing the book well in advance of publication), whereas the \u201craves\u201d are from the handful of remaining newspapers that review books?<\/p>\n

7<\/sup> If you don\u2019t<\/em> see a problem with this either, just DM me so that we can argue.<\/p>\n

8<\/sup> I love New Directions, but the world is sheep and they are easily the most established publisher of hip intellectual books just sitting out there ready to be reviewed.<\/p>\n

9<\/sup> I got so invested in banging out an old school Three Percent rant-icism that I forgot to make one very important point: this book was translated by Jonathan Wright. You wouldn\u2019t know by looking at the book\u2019s cover or it\u2019s Amazon page<\/a> but I\u2019m so very sure<\/em> that\u2019s not because Penguin doesn\u2019t give two fucks about translators, but because . . . I\u2019m out of bad jokes. Jonathan Wright once wrote a post for us<\/a> that I use in my class every year, and which, thank the gods above, always makes my students rail against Andrew Wylie, Alaa Al Aswany, commercial publishing, bad ideas of what makes a good translation, and \u201cMy wife understood my need for the solitude.\u201d So good to see you again, Jonathan. I hope you\u2019re well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back when I kicked off my 2018 Translations series I chose to include Frankenstein in Baghdad by Ahmed Saadawi as the fourth book from January I would read and review. And why not? It won the 2014 International Prize for Arabic Fiction1 and came with pretty high praise. \u201cA haunting allegory of man\u2019s savagery against […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":292,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67486],"tags":[66836,66976,66966,53386,1646],"class_list":["post-307726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-2018-translations","tag-ahmed-saadawi","tag-frankenstein-in-baghdad","tag-jonathan-wright","tag-review"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307726"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307726\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":332066,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307726\/revisions\/332066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}