May 24-May 27 2017
Georgia

Norwegian authors to attend book fair and translators seminar in Tbilisi

Norway is this year’s country in focus at the Tbilisi International Book Fair in Georgia!

A seminar for Georgian students of Norwegian as well as Georgian translators will be held Wednesday May 24. Organizing the seminar are TSUs Centre of Scandinavian studies and NORLA. Approximately 40 participants will take part, including four translators from Baku in Azerbaijan.
The main organizer of the seminar is translator Tamara Kvizhinadze, who is also NORLA’s Translator of the Month in May. If you happen to read Norwegian, you will enjoy our interview with her here.

All four authors in NORLA’s authors’ programme “New Voices” will speak at the seminar:
Roskva Koritzinsky: “The short story in Norwegian contemporary literature”
Nils Henrik Smith: “Dag Solstad and the Norwegian”
Sigbjørn Mostue: “Back to the roots – the revival of popular beliefs in Norwegian fantasy literature”.
Simen Ekern: “The battle for the soul of Europe: The growth and the future of right wing populism”.

The seminar participants will work in groups discussing the translation of the four authors’ texts.
After the seminar the participants are invited to a reception along with Georgian publishers and contacts, hosted by Norwegian embassies in Tbilisi and Baku.

Thursday May 25 sees the opening of the Tbilisi International Book Fair where Norway is focus country.
The four Norwegian authors will take part in several events. Simen Ekern will meet Lasha Bugadze to discuss politics and literature: «Are the politicians afraid of writers?». Nils Henrik Smith will meet Dato Turashvili to talk about football: «Literary goals». Roskva Koritzinsky will meet Salome Benidze to talk about identity and language: «The Road: Words and humans». Sigbjørn Mostue will meet Zaza Koshadze to talk about the choice of genres: «Why fantasy?».

On Friday May 26, NORLA will take part in a debate about being Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Georgia is Guest of Honour in Frankfurt in 2018.
All Norwegian participants will be presenting short talks about their oevre and about Norwegian literature at a book fair event Friday night.

Read more about both the four “New Voices”-authors here.

More about the international book fair in Tbilisi here.

Follow the Tbilisi book fair on Facebook.

Read more about the TSUs Centre of Scandinavian studies here.

Are you curious to see which Norwegian books have recently been published in Georgia?
Here you may enjoy the covers of books published in Georgian through NORLA’s translation subsidy (as of 2011) .

Upcoming activities

October 24-October 27
Krakow, Poland

Extensive Norwegian Program at the Krakow Book Fair

From October 24-27, NORLA will participate in the Krakow Book Fair in collaboration with the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Warsaw. The book fair coincides with the Joseph Conrad Festival in Krakow. NORLA and the embassy will have a stand at the book fair, with various activities including a bookstore, book signings, Norwegian language courses, and more.

In addition, NORLA will be hosting a seminar for non-fiction publishers and Norwegian literary agents on Thursday, October 24, featuring the authors Bjørn Berge and Ingvild Holtan-Hartwig.
Authors Kjersti Anfinnsen, Karl Ove Knausgård, Maja Lunde, and Lars Saabye Christensen have been invited by their Polish publishers to participate in the book fair and/or the Conrad Festival.

Please see our Facebook-event here

October 28
Digitally

Deadline: Submission of Endorsements for The Fosse Prize for Translators of Norwegian Literature

Following Jon Fosse’s Nobel Prize in Literature in 2023, the Norwegian government has established a new annual initiative to honor the author—a yearly Fosse Lecture with accompanying events organized by the National Library, where a Fosse Prize for Translators, worth NOK 500,000, will also be awarded. Through this initiative, the government aims to emphasize the importance of Fosse’s authorship, both in Norway and internationally.

NORLA is responsible for nominating candidates and is now requesting suggestions for eligible candidates for the nomination process. We welcome endorsements that meet certain criteria, with a brief justification (maximum 1 page), by October 28, 2024, 12:00 (CET).

November 1

Application deadline: Translation subsidy and Production subsidy

Please note that there are new application deadlines in 2024, with three deadlines in total, for Norwegian books in all genres:
1 February, 1 April and 1 November