6/02/2010

Coming Up

I'm taking part in an event as part of the Leith Festival of Literature on June Sunday 13th at Bond No 9, 84 Commercial Street in Leith at 5pm. It'll be my first trip to Edinburgh since my return to the UK, so I'm quite looking forward to it. It's an all-day event, and Fate has conspired to place me on a panel called 'SF Scramble':

Editor and Scotsman SF critic Andrew J. Wilson (Nova Scotia) in discussion with author Gary Gibson (Stealing Light, Against Gravity) and translator Edwin Hawkes on the challenges and rewards of translating genre fiction. Interspersed with readings of the very best of Japanese science fiction, fantasy and horror in English, including a sneak preview of the forthcoming English edition of Tow Ubukata’s phenomenal bestselling Mardock Scramble.

Everything I know about translating fiction could probably be scribbled on the back of a very, very small napkin, but then I've had stuff translated before, so I guess I'm there to be the voice of one who has been translated, rather than one who translates (on the other hand, I am married to someone who's done a lot of translation work herself in the past). One way or other, I know Andrew, and recently met Edwin, and I don't think the three of us'll have too much trouble getting an interesting discussion going.

And only a month to go! Empire of Light is out in hardback on July 2nd, and the paperback of Nova War is out the same day - although if past experience is anything to go by, they'll be on sale a good few days before that. If you're an ebook reader, I noticed recently that Stealing Light and Nova War are both available for the Kindle at a pretty decent price, and I've also seen the epub version of both on sale at bookdepository.com. I've no idea what the pricing on the ebook of Empire of Light will be, but it'll presumably go on sale at the start of July as well.  

3 comments:

The Antihippy said...
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The Antihippy said...

Thanks for the heads up. I quite enjoyed the discussion. It was ... cosy. It was a pity I had to leave so quickly as I had a few questions for the translator. Coincidentally this seems to be a popular topic at the moment because I've come across it recently elsewhere. As a result I'm aware of various SF from unexpected places: Philippines and Kenya to name two.

Yes you read that last one correctly. Here's a relevant link in case you are curious.

http://www.pumzithefilm.com/

I've not tracked down the Philipine SF yet (it's a collection if I remember right).

And you are shorter than I expected.

Gary Gibson, science fiction writer said...

Thanks for reminding me about Pumzi - I remember reading about it on io9 a while back.

Re: 'cosy' - I know what you mean: the Leith Festival is still very much the younger sibling to the Edinburgh Book Festival, and not that many people really know about it yet, but hopefully it'll build its reputation over the next couple of years and an audience commensurate with that.