Is translated fiction a separate genre?

Following our recent blog about the Man Booker International prize awarded this year to Korean novelist Han Kang, research conducted on behalf of the prize has found that sales of translated fiction in the UK have grown from 1.3m copies in 2001 to 2.5m in 2015 against a falling market.

Welcome though this may be in introducing readers to unfamiliar worlds and cultures, is there a danger that translated fiction might find itself unable to escape the label of genre fiction? Judith Vonberg, writing in the New Statesman (May 25 2016) thinks so.

She believes that translated fiction is too often seen as a separate category, defined by its unique characteristic of being a translation from a foreign language. This can lead to absurd consequences in the bookshop.  “Well, you’ve really enjoyed that crime novel by Jo Nesbø, why not try the latest from Elena Ferrante?” The only thing that links the two books is that they have been translated from another language, respectively Norwegian and Italian.

Vonberg argues that it is pointless and confusing to the potential reader to browse the “foreign literature” section of a bookshop where Dante, Stieg Larsen, Goethe and Han Kang share the same shelf space. We go into a book shop because we are looking for a certain type of book. If we are looking for the Cameron McCabe’s classic “The face on the cutting room floor” we might welcome a recommendation from the bookseller that we might like a Henning Mankell.

Ultimately, it is about persuading people that translated fiction can be just as enthralling as familiar English novels but they have the added advantage of introducing us to different cultures and historical backgrounds.

There are some interesting initiatives going on at the moment particularly in the smaller, independent bookshops. Vonberg cites the example of Oxygen Books whose aim is to make translated fiction more accessible to the general reader. They do this in various ways, including by integrating translated fiction into the general fiction shelves rather than casting it into the outer darkness of “translated fiction”, with the unwitting subtext of “you probably won’t like this, it’s foreign”.

It’s encouraging that little by little we are getting more used to reading translated fiction. I wonder if this trend has been helped by the Scandi noir, subtitled dramas shown to wide acclaim on BBC?  “The Killing”, “The Bridge”, “Borgen”, “Inspector Montalbano” and currently the French drama “The Disappearance” have accustomed us both to European film-making, subtitles and edge of the seat drama.

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