Communicating Literature in German Abroad

The magazine is aimed at an international audience and is a major part of a project promoting contemporary German literature abroad. Project partners are the Federal Cultural Foundation, the Goethe-Institut and the Frankfurt Book Fair.

Germany is an importing country as far as literature is concerned. The reception of German literature at home and abroad is overshadowed by the reception of foreign-language book titles in Germany. Nonetheless, there is evidence of growing international interest in contemporary German literature. Existing programmes to promote translations e.g. by the Goethe-Institut and the Frankfurt Book Fair’s offices abroad, are contributing to this upward trend. The Litrix.de – German Literature Online project, starting in January 2004, is intended to intensify the promotion of German literature abroad.

The online magazine Litrix.de is at the heart of the project, offering excerpts from outstanding new publications, specimen translations and the latest information on the German book market. Initiated and sponsored by the Federal Cultural Foundation, the project is targeted primarily at publishers, copy editors and translators abroad. The project is organised by the Goethe-Institute in Munich, where it is also based, and its cooperation partner is the Frankfurt Book Fair.

The online magazine’s goals are twofold: Firstly, to offer an international audience quick access to new publications on the German book market, and secondly, to encourage the translation of contemporary German literature world-wide.

Litrix.de presents approximately thirty current titles each year, covering fiction, non-fiction and books for children and young people in specimen translations of some twenty pages in length.

The online magazine is available in German and English. There will also be additional focal language versions. In 2004/2005 it was Arabic, in 2005/2006 Chinese, and in 2007/08 it is Brazilian Portuguese. This way translations are to be promoted in regions where literature can make an important contribution to intercultural dialogue.

The titles are selected by a first-class independent expert jury. Publishers can submit titles from their current programme to the editors which are of special interest to an international readership. Litrix.de also provides detailed background information on writers, titles and publishers. The magazine section of Litrix.de offers up-to-date information on events, interesting reading recommendations of German publishers, and an informative overview of the trends and themes in German contemporary literature.

Regional translation promotion programme

As well as the online magazine, Litrix.de also offers its own translation promotion programme for the relevant focal region. An expert jury from the target region will choose the titles from the online selection which lend themselves particularly well to translation in full and publication in the focal language.

The translation promotion programme is aimed mainly at publishers and is intended to flank existing promotion measures by the Goethe-Institute, that has been running for nearly 30 years, during which time it has provided financial support for the publication of some 4,000 books in 45 languages.

After the Arab world as the focal region in 2004/2005, the efforts focussed on China in 2005/2006, which shall be the guest country at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2009. In 2007/08 Litrix.de concentrates its attention on Brazil. It is the promotion over several years in particular, that is to foster trust and long-lasting contacts. Thus, in addition to trips for publishers and writers, sales and marketing workshops, and translators’ training workshops are offered in cooperation with various partner organisations such as the Goethe-Institute and the Literature House in Munich.

Litrix Offline

The range of information offered online is constantly broadened. However, Litrix.de’s activities extend beyond providing information on the Internet and promoting translations. Workshops for young literary translators take place in Germany once a year, aimed, among other things, at providing them with direct contacts to the German literary scene and the publishing trade. A first workshop for German and Arab translators took place in early December 2003 in cooperation with the textwerk series published by the Munich Literature House, followed by a German-Chinese exchange in 2004. Litrix.de held workshops on issues of the publishing practice in Cairo, Beijing and Shanghai in order to intensify the collaboration between publisher in the focal region and their German colleagues. Such a publishers-workshop is planned for Brazil as well.

These workshops and events are made possible through, among other things, co-operations with other literary and intermediary organisations in Germany and abroad. By making use of the world-wide infrastructure of the Goethe-Institut and Frankfurt Book Fair, Litrix.de puts German writers in touch with their readers and colleagues, translators and copy editors abroad through reading tours and discussion events taking place several times a year. In this way, Litrix.de achieves its aim to stimulate a direct exchange (of opinion) by means of and about literature.

Further information on the project is available from the following e-mail address: info@litrix.de