The British Library held an event last month to promote literature from Kazakhstan as part of the project “Contemporary Kazakh Culture in The Global World.” It was the launch of two anthologies, one of prose and another of poetry, that were translated into English. The “anthologies, which are 500 pages each and include works by 60 Kazakh poets and writers, are being translated into the six official languages of the United Nations: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.” Cambridge University Press is the publisher of the English translations.
According to the article, the “Contemporary Kazakh Culture in The Global World project is part of the Ruhani Zhangyru (Modernisation of Kazakhstan’s Identity) programme, which seeks to preserve and popularise the country’s historical and cultural heritage.”
Promoting lesser-known literatures is a laudable goal and something sorely needed in the West. But as with all projects that seek to project an image of a particular country, we need to be asking what type of image is being projected and for what reason(s), which voices are included and which left out. Of course, it is impossible to answer these questions until these anthologies become available. A project to keep an eye out for.
Punctured Lines 