August News and Highlights

Letter from Hudson Street August 2018 Dear Readers, For us, August marks the true, behind-the-scenes beginning of the fall frenzy. It's going to be a big one for us. Our office is littered with boxes of new books and new galley copies and we're lining up some exciting events in the fall about translation, travel writing, and memoir. You can get a sense of some of that over at [our events page](. On a more summery note, though, we'll be participating in the first annual [Metrograph Film Book Fair]( this month. If you're in New York, stop by. On August 11 and 12, we'll be selling books of ours that have been adapted for the screen and other titles related to film and film making ([Notes on the Cinematograph](, anyone?). It should be fun, and lots of amazing films will be screening all weekend. More info about all of this below. Now, on to the good stuff. Best wishes, The NYRB Staff Indie of the Month: Malvern Books Austin, TX ABOUT THE STORE From the staff: "[Malvern Books]( opened in October 2013 with a simple mission: to sell only the very best poetry and prose from small, independent, utterly awesome presses. We offer a lovingly curated and delightfully idiosyncratic selection of literature from indie publishers, with a focus on lesser-known and emerging voices the world needs to hear—if you want Serbian poetry in translation, a graphic novel featuring a flock of passenger pigeons, or a Dallas-based Noir short story collection, we've got it! We also host a large number of poetry and prose readings, as well as book clubs—like our very own NYRB Classics Book Club, where we discuss a different NYRB title each month. It's proven to be by far the most popular of the book clubs we've run, and we suspect it's because people love the NYRB range and trust that the books will be a great read, regardless of author or setting. As long-time Austinites, we're also thrilled to provide a community space for local book lovers, who are welcome to use the store as a venue for their own literary gatherings. Our location borders both UT Austin and a residential neighborhood, so we're handy for UT staff and students, but also cater to locals with a penchant for small press wares—although for the most part we suspect Malvern is a 'destination bookstore,' with many visitors from out of town telling us they'd heard talk of a mythical 'indie press only' bookstore and had put us on their Austin To-Do list! It always makes our day to hear this, and to know that others share in the excitement and camaraderie an independent bookstore can inspire.” BOOKS WE ARE EXCITED ABOUT We recommend NYRB’s The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares. It’s one of those books that leaves you feeling uneasy, even if you can't pinpoint exactly why. It predicts a variety of things that wouldn't appear until many decades after it was first published, like 3-D projections and reality television. Obsession, though, seems to be the underlying theme of this cautionary tale, and there are many things about it to reflect upon in this celebrity obsessed culture we live in. We also recommend Host Publications’ [After-Dinner Declarations]( by Nicanor Parra. A collection of 235 postprandial pronouncements from a renowned Chilean 'anti poet,’ mathematician, and physicist… what more could you want? Cervantes prize winner Parra—who passed away earlier this year at the grand old age of 103—offers an irreverent perspective on the modern world in this volume of playful, conversational musings. This thoughtful translation by Texas poet Dave Oliphant is the only collection of Parra’s currently available in English. Thanks, Malvern! Name That (Russian) Author NYRB Classics is proud to publish some of the best Russian writers of all time, many of whom have incredible life stories. We thought we'd create a little quiz to see how well you know the Russian authors in the series. Click through to see the answer. Who… - Was born in 1809 in Ukraine - Was praised by his contemporary, Alexander Pushkin, for his bizarre surrealism and wicked humor - Fell under the sway of an Orthodox priest who convinced him to burn a large portion of his magnum opus - Was rumored to have been buried alive [?]( Who… - Was born outside Moscow in 1955 - Trained as an engineer at the Moscow School of Oil and Gas before becoming a fixture of the Moscow underground arts scene of the 80s - Incited uproar when he depicted a sex scene between clones of Stalin and Khrushchev in his 1999 novel Blue Lard [?]( Who… - Was born in Moscow in 1892 - Lived in exile in Berlin, Prague, and Paris until returning to the Soviet Union in 1939 - Had an affair with Osip Mandelstam - Bears a last name related to the Russian word for “flower” [?]( Who… - Was born in Leningrad in 1951 into the same aristocratic family to which Leo Tolstoy belonged - Has been the co-host of the Russian TV program School for Scandal - Spent many years in the U.S. during the 70s and 80s [?]( Who… - Was born in 1899 - Was the oldest of eleven siblings and the son of a railroad worker - Had a son who was charged with being a spy and was sent to a labor camp at the age of 15 during the Great Purge of the 1930s - Died in Moscow in 1951, and was eulogized by (another author published by NYRB) Vasily Grossman [?]( Who… - Was born in 1860 in southern Russia - Worked as a physician and ran an open clinic for the poor - Lived with tuberculosis for over a decade without telling anyone - Famously said: “If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off.” [?]( Who… - Was born to Polish immigrants in Ukraine in 1887 - Was rediscovered 26 years after his death, in 1976, when literary historian Vadim Perelmuter came across his archive of fantastical stories - Remained unpublished until 1989 [?]( Who… - Was born in St. Petersburg in 1872 and named Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, though she wrote under a penname - Wrote humorous short stories that were admired by both Tsar Nicolas II and Vladimir Lenin - Had two other sisters who also became widely read authors in Russia [?]( Women in Translation Month August is officially women in translation month and so we thought we'd draw attention to some of our favorite translated books by women authors. This is just a selection. Click each cover image to learn more about the books and the writers. August with Henry David Thoreau Our monthly foray into Thoreau's [The Journal: 1837–1861](. This time, a couple of entries from August, 1853. Thoreau was thirty-five years old and apparently very uninterested in working for money. Aug. 6. More dog-days. I see the sunflower's broad disk now in gardens, probably a few days,—a true sun among flowers, monarch of August. Do not the flowers of August and September generally resemble suns and stars?—sunflowers and asters and the single flowers of the goldenrod. I once saw one as big as a milk-pan, in which a mouse had its nest. Aug. 7. How trivial and uninteresting and wearisome and unsatisfactory are all employments for which men will pay you money! The ways by which you may get money all lead downward. To have done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle. If the laborer gets no more than the wages his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself. Those services which the world will most readily pay for, it is most disagreeable to render. You are paid for being something less than a man. The state will pay a genius only for some service which it is offensive to him to render. Even the poet-laureate would rather not have to celebrate the accidents of royalty. Upcoming Events Saturday and Sunday, August 11-12, 12pm-6pm, at [Metrograph](, NYC: NYRB will be selling film-related books as part of the first annual Metrograph Film Book Fair. Sunday, August 12, 3pm, at [Longfellow House Washington's Headquarters](, Cambridge, MA: A poetry reading from award-winning poets and translators, Chloe Garcia Roberts, translator of Li Shangyin, and Ani Gjika. Tuesday, September 4, 7pm, at [Politics and Prose at Union Market](, Washington, DC: Adam Sisman, editor of Patrick Leigh Fermor: A Life in Letters, speaks about Leigh Fermor's life and travel writing. August Books [A CHILL IN THE AIR AN ITALIAN WAR DIARY, 1939-1940]( by Iris Origo [WAR IN VAL D'ORCIA AN ITALIAN WAR DIARY, 1943-1944]( by Iris Origo [SLUM WOLF]( by Tadao Tsuge [CARBONEL THE KING OF CATS]( by Barbara Sleigh [THE ISLAND OF HORSES]( by Eilís Dillon A Chill in the Air is the August selection for the [NYRB Classics Book Club](. If you join the club by August 16, A Chill in the Air will be your first selection. In the Press "Garcia Roberts’s translation represents an original approach to one of the most distinctive and challenging voices of the classical Chinese canon…Li’s startling images and aural complexity gain new life in Garcia Roberts’s hands." —Theophilus Kwek, Asymptote, on [Li Shangyin]( "With Elizabeth Hardwick as a guide, for a minute or for a long white night, one can almost forget the darkness pressing in." —Lauren Groff, [The New York Times](, "In Praise of Elizabeth Hardwick" "This collection gives Bunch's cybernetic vision of the future new life for a new generation of science-fiction readers. Almost a half-century after these stories were originally released, the thematic power of Bunch's vision still resonates, the narrative equivalent of a new-metal alloy punch to the gut. A disturbing, stark, and deeply thought-provoking collection of stories chronicling humankind's demise into heartless automatons. " —Kirkus on David Bunch's [Moderan]( [Update preferences]( [Facebook]( [Instagram]( New York Review Books 435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014 [Unsubscribe](