Wednesday, December 02, 2009

Cosecha de la FIL, Part I: Literal, Yankee Invasion, Tirofijo, Miriam Berkley, Trudy Balch and Gaby Brimmer, Best of Contemporary Mexican Fiction


Here at the Feria Internacional de Libros in Guadalajara:
Just participated in the press conference for the new anthology from Dalkey Archive, BEST OF CONTEMPORARY MEXICAN FICTION, edited by Alvaro Uribe and Olivia Sears, for which I translated the fabulous (truly, truly) short story by Alvaro Enrigue.

In the vast exhibition hall, I ran into Trudy Balch, who happened to have a copy of her translation of Gaby Brimmer's autobiography, so I'm taking that over to International PEN tomorrow morning-- that's when they take over stand #NN40, so if you're at the FIL, be sure to come on by.

Yesterday, at the presentation for Literal: Latin American Voices, Voces Latinoamericanos (much more about that anon), ran into translators Nick Hill and Jay Miskowiec, director of Aliform, who gave me a copy of the gorgeous new novel in English translation by Timothy G. Compton, Ignacio Solares's YANKEE INVASION and the hot-off-the-presses THE TRIUMPHANT VOYAGE by Eduardo Garcia Aguilar.

Also in attendance: Juancarlos Porras y Manrique, editor of Leon's elegant
TIROFIJO: REVISTA CULTURAL DEL BAJIO, among all sorts of things over at www.grupoochocientos.com (seriously, check it out, he's doing a million or, OK, maybe 800, amazing things). Miriam Berkley, the photographer of writers, a true treasure of the literary world, snapped some pix--- read more about her work in "A Literary Eye" by Larry Brownstein.