SHORT READS
July 2025
We asked our contributors what they were reading this summer—eager to gather their recommendations into a list of translations from Turkic and/or Slavic languages (loosely defined). Here are the books they wrote us about:
SUMMER READING IN
TURKIC + SLAVIC
Transparent Body & Other Poems by Romanian author Max Blecher is the lone volume of poetry he published in his short life. It's a beautiful bilingual edition translated by Christina Tudor-Sideri. I am a huge Max Blecher fan, and his writing is deeply mesmerizing.
Trans-Atlantyk by Witold Gombrowicz is a semi-autobiographical, satirical novel that really touched me and taught me a lot about the human psyche and endurance. First published in 1953, it is his most personal novel that explores and dives into philosophical, psychological, and social concerns. Translated by Carolyn French and Nina Karsov.
recommended by
DENIS
FERHATOVIĆ
You can find Denis's work in Rumba under Fire, Index on Censorship, The Riddle Ages, Iberian Connections, Trinity Journal of Literary Translation, DoubleSpeak, Asymptote, and Exchanges. His monograph Borrowed Objects and the Art of Poetry: Spolia in Old English Verse (2019) came out in paperback in the spring 2024. His translations—of poems whose authors are unknown—have appeared twice in Turkoslavia Journal: "Someone Asked for Maiden Ilinka's Hand," originally written in Kosovar Gorani, appears in the spring 2025 issue, and "Ramo and Saliha," originally written in Bosnian, is in the fall 2022 issue.
"The wild horses sped against the wind,/ And the wind played with their manes/ Like strings on a violin./ Where a skein of stallions rushed,/ Sweeping red dust away with their hooves,/ Paving grasslands with the crushed sand,/ A trail was left behind."
Dmitry Davydov. The impossibility of socialism: Leftist ideas in the service of new elites (2024). Available in Russian.
recommended by
ELENA
KOROLEVA
Elena has worked as a field researcher in the Altai region, and and as a professional translator of Altai-language historical texts. She is completing a dissertation on Altai folk legends as historical sources. Her translation of "A Song to the Blue Sky of Asia" translated into Russian from Altai by Brontoy Bedyurov, alongside three poems by Janga Todosh Bedyurov written in Altai, appear in Turkoslavia's summer 2024 issue.
recommended by
SHELLEY
FAIRWEATHER-
VEGA
Shelley's translation from Kyrgyz of Sultan Raev's novel Castigation will be published by Syracuse University Press in September 2025. The latest issue of Turkoslavia Journal features her translation of an untitled poem by Hamid Ismailov translated from Uzbek. Her translations of Ismailov, Raev, and Talasbek Asemkulov appeared in Turkoslavia's fall 2023 issue.
According to the editor, the incomparable Antonia Lloyd-Jones, The Penguin Book of Polish Short Stories "took 39 authors 100 years to write, and me about 4 years to compile and translate, with the help of 11 other translators." Covering the period since Poland first regained its independence in 1918, this selection features some of the biggest hitters in Polish literature, translated by some of the very best in the field of translation as a whole. I've been told by countless commissioning editors that "no-one reads short stories," but I'm a reader and I love short stories, so it's gratifying to see short stories in translation from such a big publishing house.
I recently read Ewelina Figarska's stunning debut novella jestem małą muszką owocówką, przyleciałam na ciebie popatrzeć (i'm a little fruit fly come to take a look at you). It is as brilliantly bonkers as the title suggests. Currently only available in Polish, but watch this space...
recommended by
ROB MYATT
Rob was the 2023 winner of the Goethe-Institut Award for New Translation for his sample translation from German of Behzad Karim Khani's Hund, Wolf, Schakal. The award is aimed at new and emerging translators based in the UK and Ireland, whose literary translation work has not yet been published in print. His translations from Polish—including the work of Sergiusz Piasecki and Dariusz Adamowski—appear in Turkoslavia's first and fourth issue, respectively.
I have just finished reading Saglar Bougdaeva’s collection and translation of Jangar: The Heroic Epic of the Kalmyk Nomads. This classic of Kalmyk oral history recites the history of the mythical steppe empire of Bumba, established and led by the wise and noble Jangar Khan, Jangar, along with his coterie of heroes and band of talking horses, must contend with rival khans, monsters like fire-breathing camels, and witches to create peace and stability for his nomadic country. Saglar Bougdaeva collected 10 cycles of the poem from a range of epic reciters, assembled, and translated them. For fans of folk epics like the Kalevala, Manas, or Gesar epics, this translation will fit right in on the shelf. It is the first translation from the Kalmyk language into English that I have come across.
The next piece of literature that I have on my summer reading list is Simon Wickhamsmith’s Suncranes and Other Stories: Modern Mongolian Short Fiction. Wickhamsmith provides English translations of Mongolian-language short fiction from a large range of authors that represent the major literary movements of 20th- and 21st-century Mongolia, as the country underwent two massive transitions, first to Soviet-adjacent socialism in the 1920s and then to open-market capitalism in the 1990s. These stories are some of the most widely read and popular pieces of fiction from the most popular authors in Mongolia today, from luminaries of Mongolian socialist realism like Erdene Seng to contemporary feminist surrealists like Ölziitögs Luvsandorj.
I wanted to put in a plug for Shelley Fairweather-Vega's translation of Mothersland by Shahzoda Samarqandi, published by Slavica. Originally written in Tajik, Mothersland explores a fractured mother-daughter relationship set in the cotton fields of Soviet-era Uzbekistan. Young Mahtab is hired by a film crew to portray her hero-worker mother in a film about cotton, but the film project takes an unexpected turn. Mahtab is forced to question everything about her own life, from her personal allegiances to Uzbekistan's place in the Soviet colonial project. Female perspectives and women-centered stories are still too rare in literature from this part of the world; it was a special treat, then, to immerse myself in Fairweather-Vega's sensitive, nuanced translation of Mothersland. Samarqandi's novel stayed with me long after I put down the book!
recommended by
KATHERINE
E. YOUNG
If you're looking for a lyrical summer read focused on the perspectives of Azerbaijani women who held things together through war, famine, and stunning Soviet mismanagement during the Second World War, you're in luck: Kate's translation of Akram Aylisli's People and Trees has been published by Plamen Press. Her translation of Iosif Pavlovich Utkin's "The Tale of Red-Haired Motele, Mister Inspector, Rabbi Isaiah, and Commissar Blokh" appears in the summer 2024 issue of Turkoslavia.