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Writing Chinese March Update

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dorothyWell, our translation competition is now closed, but we just wanted to say that we've been absolutely delighted by the response it's had! We've had entries from all over the world, and don't envy our panel of judges, who now face the difficult task of choosing a winner... Nicky Harman, Jeremy Tiang, and Helen Wang will announce their choice in April. The winning translation will then be published in the autumn issue of Structo magazine. They'll also have the chance to attend the Translate in the City summer school, where Nicky Harman will be teaching a course on Chinese-English translation. And of course, Dorothy Tse herself will be visiting Leeds for our symposium this July. Dorothy was our featured author for February, so even if you didn't enter the competition, you might want to check out her story here. (Though you'll have to wait for issue 14 of Structo before reading the translation!)

publishing poster-page-001In other news, this March we're looking more closely at the business of publishing. This Thursday, March 5th, we're joined in Leeds by publisher and translator Harvey Thomlinson, of Make-Do Publishing, to talk about the UK market for translated Chinese fiction. The event will be held at the University of Leeds, room B10 in the Parkinson Court, from 5.00-6.30 pm. The event is free, and all are welcome! Blackwells' Books will also be there, so you can further indulge yourselves with some reading matter. Harvey visited Leeds last October, alongside Chen Xiwo and translator Nicky Harman, in order to talk about Chen's fantastic The Book of Sins, so we're delighted that he's joining us again.

Alongside this event, we'll be featuring a series of articles on our blog, focusing on publishing and translation. Our first guest-post will be by Peter Gordon, editor of the Asian Review of Books. Peter founded Paddyfield, an on-line bookshop, and runs Chameleon Press, an independent publisher specialising in Asian fiction and topical non-fiction. He was also involved in setting up the Man Asian Literary Prize and the Hong Kong International Literary Festival. We're very grateful that he's taking time out of his extremely busy schedule to share his thoughts with us.

Lao MaFinally, our March bookclub stories are going to be short and sweet... Although 'sweet' might not be the right word for Lao Ma's flash fiction; stories which, whilst brief, are often also biting and blackly funny. We'll be putting up the stories very soon. In the meantime, you can find out more about Lao Ma in an excellent Time Out Shanghai article here.