Great resources from some specialized weblogs:

        - At Arabic Literature (in English) there's the useful A Look at What's New in 2012: Arab and Arabic Literature (in English)

        - At Junbungaku there's The List -- "an index of all pieces of Japanese literature coming out in English for the year 2012" (which is frequently updated, as new information becomes available)

       Three Percent's Translation Database remains, of course, the great American resource (the above two look more generally at everything translated into English -- which, given the remaining astonishing differences between the US and UK markets in what gets translated and published, is very useful -- but often means that, if you're in the US, you're more or less out of luck ...) for all (new) fiction and poetry translations, but, alas, there's no 2012 edition up yet ..... Read the rest of this post

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       In The Myanmar Times Zon Pann Pwint finds folks are finally Shining light on censored fiction.
       Until now:

For the past 50 years, literature lovers in Myanmar have been able to read only the bowdlerised versions of the short stories, novels and poems published by local writers, with much of the best material left on the cutting room floor as a result of the relentless assault of the censor's red pen.

       But apparently there's change in the air even here.
       Meanwhile, author U Min Khite Soe San reports:

"The censors have long regarded our art with suspicion," he said. "We honestly share what we know with our readers, but the censors have removed parts of novels unnecessarily with doubts beyond their duties, so that our artistic flesh is sliced away.

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       In The Telegraph "Jasper Rees talks to Laurent Binet about his playful new novel about an assasination attempt, HHhH."
       Rees notes about the book:

It all sounds highly French, and in other hands the novel's squeamish contortions might easily pall. But the book has been invaded by the playful, inquiring spirit of Kundera and incongruously contrives to be a delightful entertainment. Many French and Czech readers have certainly found so. The only readership which has not warmed to HHhH is in Germany. "Maybe you can believe that they are fed up that everyone talks about the Nazis," says Binet, "but I don't believe it."

       (I can imagine several other reasons why they didn't take to it, too .....)
       But what really caught my eye in this piece was the parenthetical note that:

Although he includes his Slovak girlfriend, he doesn't relate why he left Slovakia early: "My girlfriend was a married woman with somebody quite powerful there so there was a little scandal and the embassy decided to recall me for security reasons."

       Now that's something I would have loved to hear more about in HHhH -- a (possibly) interesting story whose details he might actually be able to offer some real insight into (as opposed to the admittedly also interesting but beaten beyond death over-familiar Heydrich story, which he offers almost nothing interesting, new, or insightful about).
       (I do have to admit that this also makes me think even less of Binet's book: admittedly, it's understandable that he'd want to censor the fact that he's the kind of shit who would have an affair with a married woman (and faced the ignominy of being recalled by his embassy), but this silence on such a significant part of the story suggests the novel as a whole is shaped even more entirely to the (very subjective) image he wants to present -- of himself, of those involved in the attempt of Heydrich's life, of Heydrich himself, etc. -- than I had previously thought (and which had already bothered me a great deal).)

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       The most recent addition to the complete review is a review-overview of Andrés Neuman's Traveler of the Century (or, as it's called in the UK, Traveller of the Century).
       Prize-winning, much-praised -- I wonder if I just had way too high expectations for this one ..... Whatever the case, I really didn't take to it; I'll probably have another look eventually.

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