Finding E-Books from Independent Publishers of Literary Translation by Nora Dolliver, Librarian, Jewish Division, Stephen A. Schwarzman BuildingMay 12, 2020

Book covers for (l-r): Cars on Fire by Monica Ramon Rios, Doppelganger by Dasa Drndic, Innocence by Heda Margolis Kovaly, and Alexandrian Summer by Yitzhak Gormezano Goren
Some e-books I’ve enjoyed recently: Cars on Fire (Open Letter), Doppelganger (New Directions), Innocence; Or, Murder on Steep Street (SoHo Press), Alexandrian Summer (New Vessel) 

Translation, writes Edith Grossman in Why Translation Matters, “permits us to savor the transformation of the foreign into the familiar and for a brief time to live outside our own skins, our own preconceptions and misconceptions. It expands and deepens our world, our consciousness, in countless, indescribable ways.” Even in happier circumstances, with a fuller range of life’s pleasures within reach, the opportunity to step outside of ourselves and our surroundings is precious. But in these particularly difficult times of mass suffering and isolation, and with half the world's population currently under orders to stay indoors and avoid gathering, the possibilities for connection and grounding that this literature offers is indispensable. With a New York Public Library card and an internet-connected device (even your phone), you can access foreign-language literature in Englsh translation for free at home.

Like another NYPL librarian before me, I have to confess that I’ve never been one for e-books. Since I gravitate toward books translated from the so-called “small languages,” especially those published by small presses, I’d always assumed that if an e-book even existed, it wouldn’t be held by the library. But after the release of the 2020 Best Translated Book Awards Longlist earlier this month, I decided to search for a few titles in our catalog and was stunned (and not a little chagrined) by what I found: the vast majority of works in translation that I’ve bought over the past few years are available for free in e-book form. It just might take a little elbow grease to find them.

Book covers for (l-r): Book of Blam by Aleksandar Tisma, Strike Your Heart by Amelie Nothomb, a Quiet Place by Seicho Matsumoto, and Eventide by Therese Bohman
More e-books I’ve enjoyed recently: The Book of Blam (New York Review Books), Strike Your Heart (Europa Editions), A Quiet Place (Bitter Lemon Press), Eventide (Other Press)

Let’s get the bad news out of the way first: Literature in translation is not overtly identified in any way on NYPL’s Overdrive page. You won’t find sections corresponding to different world regions, or even a “world literature” section. Instead, works in translation are simply categorized by the genre or genres that best describe them, like literature or mystery. Finally, searching Overdrive for something like “Czech literature” or “translated from the Catalan” is not likely to yield many relevant results (though you can try that in the catalog and then limit your search to items available online).

If you have a specific book or author in mind, all you have to do is search (and you should, even if you assume we don’t have it: we likely have more than you think). But what if you want an experience closer to the serendipity of wandering through your favorite bookstore and letting something catch your eye? Here are a couple of tricks I use to find new-to-me foreign-language literature in English translation.

Browse by translator

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The “Creators” tab for Accommodations (Transit Books) lists Wioletta Greg as author and Jennifer Croft as translator 

You might already be searching for new books to read using your favorite author’s name. But did you know that you can also search for a translator’s name? If you have a translator in mind, you can search for their name just like you would an author’s. But if you don’t remember who translated that really great book you read last year, you can find out by looking up the book. Translators’ names are typically listed in two places on an overdrive record: sometimes right beneath the author’s name, and then again in the “Creators” tab. Click on their name and you’ll be able to browse the other items that list them as a creator. Sometimes the book you just looked up will be the only one of their works held by NYPL, but other times you may discover a new favorite author you’d never even heard of.

Browse by Publisher

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The “Details” tab for The Hospital (Ahmed Bouanani, trans. Lara Vergnaud) lists New Directions as the publisher 

Next to the “Creators” tab in an Overdrive record you’ll find a “Details” tab, which lists an item’s publisher. Browsing by publisher is by far the best way I’ve found to capture the breadth of literature in translation available at NYPL. Between stalwart heavy hitters like Europa Editions and New Directions and smaller, newer outfits like Transit Books and New Vessel, a number of fantastic independent publishers are represented among our holdings. 

There’s not a good way to search by publisher on Overdrive, but one easy way is to start with a book you already know is from a publisher you respect. If you click on the publisher’s name in the “details” tab, you’ll be taken to all the books we have with the same publisher ID. For your convenience, I’ve done that for you and linked to a selection of publishers below.

This is not a foolproof method to view every book published by a given publisher. Some publishers appear to have multiple publisher IDs, meaning that you won’t find all of the books from that publisher using the method I’ve described. For those cases, simply searching for the publisher’s name (in quotes) is likely the best method. Another complication is that many of these small presses are actually distributed by larger publishers. In some cases, it’s the larger publisher that you’ll find listed in the “Details” tab, making it difficult or impossible to browse books only from a specific press.

This is by no means a comprehensive list. I’ve left off some great publishers (like Dorothy, a Publishing Project, Peirene Press, and Biblioasis) because very few of their books are available, or because of the books we have very few of them are works in translation. Once you’re browsing by publisher, there’s no way to further limit your search to only translations. But since the publishers below publish a lot of high-quality literature in translation, they’re a good starting point.

Before you start reading, one request: we often only have a single copy of a given book from small publishers like these. That means that if you’re reading a book, nobody else can read it until you return it. So please, help your fellow New Yorkers out and return them when you’re finished.

Quick links to publishers

If you have any questions about these, or any other online resource, feel free to email us. The Library may be closed, but staff are still available and eager to help.

View all posts by Nora Dolliver