EDWARD GAUVIN

For International Translation Day this year, artist Claire Stephens and I created a comic strip! A short Borgesian fable about the strangeness of gradual intimacy with a foreign tongue: “Going Native”! And you can find it at that online cornerstone of international letters, Words Without Borders, where it is proudly sponsored by Amazon Crossing, Amazon’s world literature imprint.

The pitch for this series could not have been simpler: Highlander, with a hot babe. It’s written by Christophe “License to Print Money” Arleston, superstar of French epic fantasy comics with his Lanfeust universe, and drawn by Thierry Labrosse. Fair warning: kids and progressives, keep a wide berth. The fourt volume of the ongoing series Morea, A Whiff of Eternity, is now available as a digital exclusive from Soleil at Comixology.

Morea, the immortal, has finally come back to the Earth after her forced stay in space… And on Mars! She knows now that the fight between the Dragons and Angels began on the red planet and will end on the blue one.

But if, as she looks for a way to end this war, Morea hopes to take advantage of her immense fortune, she is in for a shock. Her enemies are ready to attack her on all fronts, including from within the DWC!

This well-meaning and, on the whole, fairly innocent kids’ entertainment inspired by the City Palace in Udaipur nevertheless bungles its treatment of social themes (from the caste system to drug legalization) and fails to avoid, in its lightly fantasized exotic setting, some icky issues of cultural appropriation. Prolific and bestselling scripter Eric Corbeyran (now in charge of Assassin’s Creed) collaborates with Melvil, who draws a cute cow, to bring us a colorful and briskly paced two-parter with mythological overtones, based loosely on the short life of Princess Krishna Kumari, who at the tender age of 16 martyred herself to secure her people peace.

This second and final volume of the Natty adventure picks up where the last left off: Natty is alone in the underworld fighting for her survival while her family up above engages in a wild search for her. Sami manages to escape from prison, and with agility, willpower, and a dose of good luck, he and Natty make their way back to the palace. After some initial difficulties, Natty is recognized by her parents as the Princess, and she and Sami live happily ever after. They even find a way to bring sunlight to the lower levels of the kingdom.

Eighty pages of story are now yours for the taking as a digital exclusive from EuropeComics on a number of platforms (Izneo, Kindle, Kobo, Google Play, and Comixology).

Jessica, Volume 6 of Golden City, an all-ages series written by Daniel Pecqueur with art by Nicolas Malfin, is  now available as a digital exclusive from Delcourt at Comixology. With this book, the first arc of the series comes to a close.

The real Harrison Banks is in the hands of Professor Seed and Brad, the usurpers of his inheritance, and they have arranged for his execution by the authorities of Golden City. Meanwhile, the Jackal’s secret is finally revealed, as an unlikely team of heroes, with varied motivations, is about to risk all to save Harrison from certain death.

The latest issue of Anomaly (formerly Anomalous), guest edited by Rachel Cordasco, is devoted to translated spec fic by women, and features my translation Belgian fabulist Anne Richter’s early story “The Great Beast” among some brilliant work from around the globe!

Rachel runs the site Speculative Fiction in Translation, the go-to clearinghouse for all information on science fiction, fantasy, and everything in between being translated into English.

Anne Richter (1939 – ) is a prominent Belgian author, editor, and scholar of the fantastic. Her first collection, Le fourmi a fait le coup, was written at the age of fifteen and translated as The Blue Dog (Houghton Mifflin, 1956) by Alice B. Toklas, who praised her in the preface. She is known for her twice-reprinted international anthology of female fantastical writers, whose introductory essay she expanded into a study of the genre. She has also edited official anthologies of the fantastical work of Meyrink and de Maupassant. Her four collections have won her such Belgian honors as the Prix Franz De Wever, the Prix Félix Denayer, the Prix du Parlement, and the Prix Robert Duterme. She is a member of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, the Association of Belgian Writers, and PEN. My translations of her work have appeared in Ann and Jeff VanderMeers’ anthology of feminist speculative fiction, Sisters of the Revolution (PM Press, 2015), and online at The Collagist.

Here’s an excerpt:

Then they turned to me and said, “It’s settled; you’re the one who’ll be going. Don’t think we made this decision lightly; we had lots of reasons for choosing you. For one, to the victor go the spoils; you’re the one who discovered the beast that washed ashore one morning. Really, all we did was witness your discovery. And so, by law, you should make the most of it. But up until now, you haven’t done a thing. There it lies, inviolate, still as a shipwreck. Can’t you see it mocks us? It’s up to you to unravel this living riddle. That gaping mouth, cool as a mausoleum, is all yours, as is that thick carpet of a tongue of indeterminate color. Think of your parents, your village! Go forth without fear. If the mouth swallows you, too bad. You shouldn’t have been playing hooky on the beach. If it lets you back out safe and sound, so much the better. We’ll know more than we do now. Go! Your parents’ wishes go with you.”