נשים בתרגום

 (NOTE: An English summary of this data will be shared in a separate post.)

"חודש נשים בתרגום"

"נשים בתרגום" זה לא מושג מוכר בישראל, ואפשר להבין למה.

מה משמעות המושג הזה? למה הכוונה? האם מתייחס לנשים בתוכן הסיפור? סופרות? מתרגמות? ומה עם סופרות א-בינריות? 

"נשים בתרגום" מתאר ספרות מתורגמת שנכתבה במקור על ידי נשים. המושג מגיע מאנגלית, Women in Translation, בעקבות מחקרים שנעשו על תרגומים ספרותיים שהראו כי נשים מהוות רק כ-30% מכלל התרגומים החדשים לאנגלית של ספרות יפה ושירה. כשמוסיפים תרגומי ספרי עיון, קלאסיקות, וספרות ילדים/נוער, אחוז הסופרות יורד לכ-25%. אך המושג "נשים בתרגום" אינו משקף את כל הסיפור. 

קודם כל, בהמשך לטעות הנפוצה: ״נשים בתרגום״ מתייחס לסופרות, לא למתרגמות. עבודת התרגום היא אכן עבודה מאתגרת במיוחד, אך כוונת הפרויקט היא למשוך את תשומת הלב לקולן של הסופרות וסיפוריהן.

בנוסף, לא מדובר רק בנשים! "נשים בתרגום" גם מעודד ומפרסם ספרות מאת סופרים/ות א-בינאריים/ות או סופרים טרנסים שבוחרים להכלל. 

ולבסוף, כשאנחנו מדברים על ״נשים בתרגום״ בהקשר הישראלי, אנחנו לא באמת מדברים על תרגומים מכל השפות באופן שווה. כי בעצם - הכוונה היא דווקא לספרות שמתורגמת משפות שאינן אנגלית.

אז מהו בעצם חודש נשים בתרגום? כל שנה במהלך חודש אוגוסט אנחנו מכירים, מפרסמים וחוגגים את הספרות הנפלאה הזו.

(הערת אגב: אמנם אני יזמתי את הפרויקט בראשיתו, ואני כמובן דוברת עברית, אך המושג ״נשים בתרגום״ ראה אור לראשונה בעברית בבלוגים ספרותיים שהגיעו לפרויקט דרך קהילת הספרות דוברת האנגלית, לא דרכי!)

בשנה שעברה, התראיינתי אצל דפנה לוי במוסף הספרותי "המוסך". זו הייתה בעיניי אחת השיחות המעניינות ביותר בנושא נשים בתרגום שהשתתפתי בהן, ולא רק כי סוף סוף הייתה לי הזדמנות לדבר גם על נושאים הקשורים לישראל באופן ספציפי, אלא שהכתבה מהווה מבוא מקיף ומעמיק לכל פרויקט ״נשים בתרגום״ בשנים האחרונות.

עכשיו הגיע הזמן לדבר על המצב בישראל. 

אנשים בארץ בדרך כלל מצביעים על הצלחתן של מספר מצומצם של סופרות דוברות אנגלית כסימן לכך שפרויקט "נשים בתרגום" חסר משמעות. "תראי עד כמה ג'יי קיי רולינג מוצלחת! מה פתאום צריך חודש נשים בתרגום?" (וכן, זו תמיד הדוגמא...) אמירות כאלה מפספסות את מהות הפרויקט.

נחזור רגע להגדרת נשים בתרגום בהקשר של ספרות מתורגמת לאנגלית. אצל קוראים דוברי אנגלית ישנה נטייה לקרוא מעט מאוד ספרות מתורגמת, והמעט שיוצא לאור אינו זוכה לקהל רחב. אבל בהקשר העברי, ערבי, לטבי, סיני, אינדונזי, מלאיאלאם, לא-משנה-באיזה-שפה-מדברים-חוץ-מאנגלית, יש פער עצום כשבוחנים את שפת המקור של הספרות המתורגמת. נכון, בעברית יש מלא תרגומים... אך כמעט כולם מאנגלית. 

בהחלט צריך להתייחס לפערים מגדריים ותרבותיים בספרות שמתורגמת מאנגלית. לא סתם קיימים באנגלית ארגונים שלמים לקידום סופרות (למשל, VIDA או ReadWomen) וכמובן שיש גם פערים אחרים, למשל בקידום סופרים/ות שחורים/ות, ספרות מהגרים, ספרות עמים ילידים, ספרות מעמד פועלים, ספרות קווירית וכו'. ובכל זאת.

כמה ספרות מתורגמת באמת קיימת בעברית?

בשנה שעברה, אספתי מידע לגבי כל הפרסומים של מספר הוצאות לאור בישראל: עם עובד, הספרייה החדשה, תשע נשמות, אחוזת בית, עליית גג, בבל, ו-כנרת, זמורה-ביתן, דביר.

פרסומים לפי שפה, 2018

הדבר הראשון שבולט לעין: לא חסרים תרגומים מאנגלית. להפך - תרגומים מאנגלית שולטים בשוק הישראלי. סך הכל, 41% מהספרים שיצאו לאור ב-2018 בהוצאות אלו נכתבו במקור בעברית, 41% נכתבו במקור באנגלית, ו-18% מכל שאר שפות העולם (כאשר ספר אחד - שנכתב במקור בקוריאנית - בעצם תורגם מהתרגום לאנגלית, לא מקוריאנית באופן ישיר). אם נתייחס לספרות מתורגמת כקבוצה עצמאית, אנגלית מייצגת 69% מכלל הספרות המתורגמת לעברית.

חשוב לציין כי במידה מסוימת בחרתי במוציאים לאור האלה כי ידעתי שהם מפרסמים "יותר" ספרות בינ"ל ולא רק תרגומים מאנגלית. בהוצאה הגדולה ביותר שבדקתי, שגם מאוד מייצגת את ה"מיינסטרים" הישראלי (כנרת, זמורה-ביתן, דביר), האחוזים דווקא נטו עוד יותר לכיוון תרגומים מאנגלית, כאשר 48% מכלל הספרים שיצאו לאור ב-2018 היו תרגומים מאנגלית, 44% ספרות מקור מעברית, ו-8% משאר שפות העולם.

הדומיננטיות של אנגלית בהקשר של תרגומים לעברית לא מפתיעה אך כן מאכזבת. ספרות אמורה לחשוף אותנו להשקפות עולם שונות, למצבים שונים, לסיפורים שונים. איך אנחנו אמורים להבין את העולם אם אנחנו כל הזמן נחשפים רק לארה"ב ואנגליה?

מה ההבדלים המגדריים?

נתחיל מהשאלה: כמה ספרים מאת נשים או גברים יוצאים לאור בישראל בכל שנה? מתוך מבחר המו"לים שבדקתי, ב-2018 מדובר בפער מפתיע: כ-57% מכל הספרים שיצאו לאור נכתבו על ידי גברים, 41% על ידי נשים, ו-2% ספרים שנכתבו על ידי גברים ונשים ביחד ("משולב"). לא ציפיתי להבדל כזה גדול - בעבר התרשמתי שהמצב בישראל מאוד שוויוני בין סופרות לסופרים. מאיפה הפער מגיע?

בחרתי לחלק את הנתונים לקבוצות. קודם כל, הסתכלתי אך ורק על ספרים שנכתבו במקור בעברית - שם הפער קטן יותר, כאשר 54% סופרים, 44% סופרות, ו-2% משולב. אחוזי התרגומים מאנגלית הם לפי אותה עקומה - 56% סופרים, 41% סופרות, 3% משולב. תרגומים מכל שאר השפות שאינן אנגלית נראו לגמרי אחרת. כאן, רק שליש (33%) מהספרים נכתבו על ידי נשים, כאשר 65% נכתבו על ידי גברים ו-2% משולב.

 

ספרות מקור + מתורגמת

ספרות מתורגמת (כולל אנגלית)

ספרות מתורגמת (ללא אנגלית)

פערים קיימים גם בחתכים אחרים, כמו ז'אנר. הגדרתי כמה ז'אנרים כלליים כדי לנסות להבין אם יש פערים בין נושאים מסוימים... ואכן יש. ז'אנרים כמו ספרות ילדים, ספרות נוער, וסיפורת/ספרות יפה לרוב כללו אחוז גבוה יותר של סופרות (לדוגמא, נוער) או אחוזים מאוד דומים של סופרים וסופרות (ילדים וסיפורת), לפחות בעברית. כלומר מכיוון שרוב הספרים שיוצאים לאור בישראל שייכים לז'אנר ספרות יפה/סיפורת, לא מפתיע שתמיד חשתי שהמצב בעברית די שוויוני - 51% מסיפורת מקור נכתבה על ידי נשים.

אחוז סופרות מתוך פרסומים בעברית (מקור)

אחוז סופרות מתוך פרסומים בעברית (מקור)

אבל כן חשוב לשים לב לז'אנרים החריגים מבחינת פערים מגדריים, ספציפית עיון ושירה. שני הז'אנרים האלה מהווים עולם ומלואו בספרות מקור וספרות מתורגמת. בשירה למשל, רק 17% מהפרסומים הם מאת נשים (פירושו של דבר - ספר בודד); איך ייתכן כי ב-2018 נתון כזה מייצג את כל ספרי השירה מאת נשים ממבחר מו"לים מובילים בישראל? בעיון - הז'אנר השני בגודלו בישראל - רק 27% מהספרים נכתבו על ידי נשים. האמנם נשים באמת לא כותבות בז'אנרים האלה? או שאולי סתם פספסתי משהו? אלו שאלות להמשך.

אותה מגמה נראית גם בתרגומים מאנגלית, שם שוב קיים פער עצום בעיון (רק 16% סופרות, מתוך 25 ספרים סה״כ). בהתחשב במעמד של ספרי עיון (ביוגרפיה, היסטוריה, מדע פופולרי, ועוד), יש חשיבות חברתית מקיפה לפער המגדרי. המשמעות של צמצום פרסום סופרות היא שקוראים ישראלים אינם נחשפים להשקפות עולם שונות (שלא נדבר על זה שכמעט כל הספרים נכתבו על ידי גברים לבנים ולא משקפים את העולם דובר האנגלית בשום פנים ואופן).  

מעודד לראות שלמרות המחסומים העומדים בפני סופרות דוברות אנגלית, הן דווקא מתורגמות לעברית במידה שוויונית. בהחלט דבר שצריך להתגאות בו. בנוסף, מעניין אך לא מפתיע לראות כי מעט ספרי הרומנטיקה שפורסמו נכתבו על ידי נשים. מצד שני, לא ברור למה כולם נכתבו במקור באנגלית.

אחוז סופרות מתוך תרגומים מאנגלית

אחוז סופרות מתוך תרגומים מאנגלית

המצב נהיה מעט הזוי כשמנתחים את הנתונים של שאר שפות העולם. למרות שקיימים ספרים מתורגמים בסוגי ז'אנרים שונים (כמו מתח, עיון, ושירה), ייצוג סופרות בז'אנרים אלה פשוט לא קיים. כפי שניתן לראות בטבלה בהמשך, יש מעט ספרים מתורגמים בסך הכל, אבל בכל זאת מדובר בפערים בולטים ובלתי נתפסים. והפער בז'אנר המוביל בתרגומים בינ"ל הוא לא פחות מרגיז - רק 35% מסיפורת מתורגמת מכלל שפות העולם שאינן אנגלית, נכתבו על ידי נשים. 

אחוז סופרות מתוך תרגומים (ללא אנגלית)

אחוז סופרות מתוך תרגומים (ללא אנגלית)

פירוט מגדרי של כלל התרגומים משפות שאינן אנגלית

הנתונים אולי שונים מעט בקרב מו"לים אחרים או בשנה האחרונה. אבל לאור העובדה שהנתונים שאספתי דומים מאוד לאלה משנת 2017 (שלא פרסמתי כאן), סביר להניח שהמגמות שציינתי לעיל מייצגות די טוב את עולם הספרות הישראלי ככלל.

אני מאוד מקווה שנוכל ללמוד מהממצאים הנ"ל לגבי הפערים - גם מבחינת תרגומים משפות שונות וגם מבחינת מגדר - במטרה להרחיב את מגוון הספרים שיוצאים לאור בישראל מדי שנה. בסופו של דבר, נרצה שהנוף הספרותי שלנו ישקף את העולם שבו אנו חיים. יש כל כך הרבה ספרים מכל העולם, ובוודאי שגם המון, המון סופרות מוכשרות, מעניינות ומרגשות. העולם עצום ומדהים - למה שלא נחשף לכולו גם בעברית?

WITMonth Day 24 | Stats (part 3) | Introducing a new project

One of the biggest lingering questions facing the women in translation movement has to do with... the world. Literature in translation is a nice catchphrase, but when we focus so much on English, it's easy to forget that the reason the literature is in translation is because it's originally written in other languages. Most literature does not get translated, not into English and not into other languages across the globe. Anywhere you go, you're likely to find a degree of marginalization in translation, simply because only select titles even get to breach that gap... and fewer still break out into the mainstream.

People have long asked what the source of the "women in translation" problem is. When we're talking about translations into English, it's obvious that there's a huge problem (see: literally every stats post prior to this one...), but there's a legitimate question to be had regarding source languages. If women writers are thoroughly underrepresented in their original countries/languages, doesn't it stand to reason that they'd be underrepresented in English (or other) translation as well?

I'll note that I don't actually buy this claim. Translation is a form of selection/curation, and as with all cases in which specific, select titles are chosen, there is absolutely no reason to adhere to "natural" forces and not choose with a sharper eye. As I've argued before, exclusion is a choice.

But let's get back to that question: How are women writers represented in other languages and countries? What can we learn about how women are then represented in translation, and specifically in translation into English?

As you can imagine, these aren't easy questions to answer or approach. For starters, it's hard to know what goes on in other languages when you don't speak those languages! Luckily, I do happen to speak one other language fluently and I do happen to have a degree of familiarity with another country's publishing industry, and so I decided to carry out a new project this year and see whether I could begin to answer the above questions.

I began by selecting a few major Israeli publishers and examining their catalogs over two years - 2017 or 2018. Simply put, I do not have the time or resources to compile a more comprehensive list, much as I'd love to. I wanted to look at a few different matters. First of all, I have long had the feeling that the translation rate out of Hebrew (just around 33% women writers) is not reflective of the actual Israeli market. Women writers are extremely popular here, often topping the bestseller charts. Could it possibly be that the rates in English are actually representative of a bias in Hebrew itself that I've simply never noticed? I wanted to compare overall publication of original titles by men and women, to see what that source of the problem in English really is.

Then there's the question of translations. Every time I walk into a bookstore or go bookhunting during Hebrew Book Week, I always have to explain to the booksellers that I'm explicitly not seeking books originally written in English, since I would much rather read those books in the original. Time after time, I have seen the booksellers' faces drop somewhat, and they begin to scramble to find alternatives. I have long felt that translations from English dominate the Israeli book market, not just in terms of all literature in translation, but even in comparison to original Hebrew-language literature. And this in turn led to my final question: What of those translations? Are women writers well represented in translation between different languages?

There's a lot to learn from what I found.

(To be continued...)

WITMonth Day 6 | Stats (part 1) | Let's do things a little differently...

The annual stats posts have become a WITMonth fixture. While I haven't written stats for every single year since 2014, stats are typically among the most popular of my August posts and the ones that people find most useful in understanding why we need a month dedicated to promoting women in translation. The truth is, though, I've started to feel that the stats as I've presented them until now have only given part of the picture. People have often - rightfully! - asked me how things were changing, and whether I'm pleased with the gradual yearly upticks. And it's true, the numbers are increasing! In some cases, the situation is even increasing at a surprising and thoroughly heartening rate, as you'll soon see. It seemed unnecessary to rehash the same things as last year.

I decided to do two things a little bit differently this year. First, this post uses a different methodology for data collection than previous years and has a much more limited scope. The next stats installations will also focus on a new language (not English!!!) for the first time, but we'll get there. For now, let's take a brief look at women in translation through a very specific lens: What happens when we include all of those books that until now have been excluded? What happens if we... do things a little differently?

Until now, the methodology for these stats posts has been fairly simple: I've worked using the marvelous Three Percent database (formerly at that website, now hosted by Publisher's Weekly) and worked within the confines of their database's definitions. That is, it looked at first-time translations of fiction and poetry. Wonderful as it is, I've long felt that there must be something missing in that extra data. What happens when you factor in children's literature? Is nonfiction still dominated by men writers? How do reissues feed into existing biases?

There were things I simply wouldn't be able to find out by working with an existing database, and so I decided to start building a list of my own and looking at catalogs directly. The purpose was never to have something truly encompassing or all-defining, rather to get a stronger feel for publisher catalogs and the status of women in translation across different publishers. It also meant that I was very loose about which publishers I selected, largely disregarding regional constraints (i.e., I looked at both US and UK publishers). For this reason, it's very important for me to note that this year's methodology is not scientific or necessarily the "full" picture in the same way as might have been in previous years. Publishers were chosen through my personal choice, as well as ease of data collection. These stats are meant to reflect, not to define.

So! Disclaimers aside, let's dive into what I found...

We'll start with the good news: Things are improving! I checked several publishers who had previously displayed poor rates of publishing women in translation and found some surprisingly positive stats. Take New Directions, for example. New Directions is a publishers that had a gently upward trending rate over five years of data, but they were one of few publishers who responded last year with surprise at their low rates and a pledge to do better. While this year's data obviously reflects books that were already in the pipeline, the leap is huge - from not-quite reaching the 30% rate in 2018, New Directions' 2019 catalog (best as I can tell) is perfectly balanced, with 10 books by men and 10 books by women (in translation, of course). These include, as I mentioned earlier, both nonfiction and reissued works. Even with categories that we may assume are more likely to favor men writers (and I'll elaborate on this at a later time), we see that New Directions actually landed on perfect parity.

Other "never-quite-there" publishers also managed to up their games. Open Letter, almost perpetually with one book more by men than by women, finally shifted their balance to publish more women than men in 2019. Europa Editions came as close as possible to their 2015 parity, with a one book difference between men and women in translation. And FSG, one of the big-name publishers that has long been solidly dominated by men-writers, came surprisingly close to 50% as well. I also tossed in some independent British publishers like Charco Press or Fitzcarraldo Editions, and found that they did fairly well in terms of their gender balance, with Charco over 50% and Fitzcarraldo just under. If we were to include AmazonCrossing, the heavyweight champion of women in translation, I'm certain the overall picture would look very rosy. In general, the fact that there have been shifts in specific, previously disappointing publishers is wonderful news and I do not want that lost in what I'm going to write next. So let me reiterate: Things are getting better!

And yet.

Part of the reason I opted for this new analysis methodology was to get a better sense of the nuances behind the data. Knowing that the average publication rate for women writers in translation is going up is brilliant, but it's also, still, only part of the picture. While certain publishers are improving, which aren't? Are there certain fields or genres that remain particularly hostile to women writers? How can we begin to fix those? Where do we need to be looking?

I started by looking at publishers that I feel sit on the bubble of disappointment - definitely not great, but also not as bad some others. (High praise, indeed.) Take Pushkin Press, for example. If we take its combined catalogs (children's imprint alongside adult), we have reasonable 39% translation rate. Not bad! But if we split the two catalogs (and indeed, that's how Pushkin themselves market the books), we see that the children's imprint (which includes both kidlit and YA) tilts the playing field, with the latter imprint at a 60% and the adult at 32%. It's worth noting that Pushkin Children has certain series that may be contributing that 60%, though of course this may be a recurring theme - I'll need to collect more data to be certain. Another note: one of the Pushkin Press catalogs I sampled (representing different seasons) had near balance and the other had a sharp 2:12 ratio, which seems to suggest that there is no targeted effort on the part of the publisher. Again, something worth tracking.  

Another disappointment was a publisher I looked at for the first time: MacLehose Press. This is one of the more prominent and well-respected British literature-in-translation publishing houses, yet they sit at a not-great 26% women in translation rate. (It's telling, I think, that I call 26% "not-great"; after all, when the base rate has hovered between 28-31% for the past 5 years, that's a pretty reasonable stat, isn't it?) (No.)

One of the more personally frustrating stats came from NYRB. While it has an overall higher rate than MacLehose, for example (at almost 30%), it's disappointing given that they were positively receptive to the problem last year (again, see this post). My hope is that this is a delay bias (in terms of works already in the pipeline) and that we'll see higher numbers from NYRB in the near future. In the meantime, it's more of the same. Here at least, like with Pushkin, we see some benefit from the inclusion of a children's literature imprint... but not much of one. Graphic novels don't seem to shift things much in either direction, perhaps because there aren't many overall.

And then. Then things start to get infuriating. 

...to be continued. (Graphs to follow in the next post!)

WITMonth Day 23 | Stats (part 3)

Introduction

Here's the thing about math: Cold as it may be, it can often hide pervasive truths. Numbers don't lie, but they can mislead. They can omit. And sometimes, even as they tell the truth, they hide its depth and scope.

I've been publishing yearly statistics for a while now, but each time it feels like a snapshot. Every year, I get comments along the lines of "okay, but this is just an outlier" or "the average is skewed" or something to that extent. If we're being fair, these arguments aren't wrong. If a publisher is consistently doing good work in terms of publishing women in translation and suddenly has a bad year, isn't it a little silly to single them out? Wouldn't we expect to see some fluctuation in the rates of publication and publication trends themselves?

And so I did what any reasonable scientist would do: I decided to look at the bigger picture. Instead of analyzing data year-by-year, I decided to look at the past five years as a whole (2013-2017), representing the five WITMonths that mark this project.

The problem is that the data doesn't actually change. Yes, numbers may hide nuances, but in this case... they don't. That generally unchanged average of 28-30% publication of women in translation? It's unchanged because most of the prominent publishers of literature in translation haven't changed anything. Not in their averages, and not year by year. As you will see, there's a disheartening lack of progress. Hopefully seeing these numbers laid out will trigger the realization that yes, something needs to change.

Results

The first thing I decided to look at was the total number of books published from 2013-2017. I selected major publishers based on their overall translation publication rates, and mapped out the flat sum of books published by men or by women. As you can see, overall publication rates vary widely between different publishers, with some "major" publishers only releasing 15 or so books over five years. Even so, it's very easy to see that the overwhelming majority of publishers not only publish more men than women in translation, but do so at staggering rates. This becomes even more apparent in the figure below:

If 30% has been the approximate base rate of publishing women writers in translation for every year since 2013, it seems likely that most major publishers would simply hover around this rate. It turns out that this isn't actually true, and that the influence of a single publisher - AmazonCrossing - is even greater than I had previously assumed (alongside the significantly more minor effect of smaller publishers, which I did not include in these counts). If we take the grand sums of all of the top publishers, the rates of publication of women writers look fairly similar to those yearly values: 31% books by women writers. But if we remove AmazonCrossing, the rate fairly plummets to 24%.

It's not hard to see why. Out of the major publishers, only two even reach 50% (Deep Vellum at a solid 1:1, AmazonCrossing at 61%), with 5 additional publishers crossing the industry average of 30% (Other Press, Open Letter, HMH, Bitter Lemon, and Atria). There are then a few publishers that hover around the industry average (Europa Editions, Seagull Books, Graywolf, Minotaur) and publish just over 25% women in translation, followed by a shocking sequence of 15 big-name, high-prestige, acclaimed publishers of literature in translation that don't even come close. Publishers like Dalkey Archive, New Directions, Archipelago, Gallic Books, Knopf... it's not even an imbalance, as much as an outright lack.

This made me wonder whether I was missing something fundamental. In order to make sure these numbers weren't as a result of a single outlier, I looked at each of the five years individually for six major publishers, going both by sheer numbers of books translated and publishers who were frequently associated with publishing literature in translation.

There are a few interesting takeaways from this breakdown. First: It's interesting to note that AmazonCrossing wasn't always as focused on publishing women in translation as it is today. It also shows that the 60% rate cited above is a low-ball, shifted somewhat because of 2013. Since 2014, they have published comfortably more women writers than men in translation. They remain the only major publisher to do so. (Remember that many smaller publishers such as Feminist Press consistently focus on books by women writers, even if I do not include them specifically in these stats posts!)

Things get a little complicated after that. I actually first want to highlight Open Letter, since they're a bit of an interesting case in this group. With an overall rate of 34%, they fall somewhat on the side of better publication of women writers. But as you can see, this mostly follows a back-and-forth fluctuation - one above, one below. They also never quite make it to 50%. In my mind, Open Letter serves as a great reminder of what happens if you just follow the market flow without any critical assessment. This is the ultimate baseline... and no, it isn't good enough.

Next we have publishers like Europa Editions and Seagull Books. Both have rates just under the industry average (~28%), where it seems like a single year pushes that number just a bit lower (for Seagull, 2015; Europa, 2017). Even so, neither publisher quite manages to break free of the industry average. Europa does have one year of publishing parity, but it too is an outlier in a different way - it's the year in which they published the least amount of books in translation overall. Seagull's situation is a little more erratic, again showing how prevalent the baseline 30% really is.

In the next category, we have an interesting, singular example of a publisher that has been improving in their stats from year to year: New Directions. Despite publishing approximately the same number of books every year since 2013, they have steadily increase the share of books by women that are released per year. While they have yet to crack the base threshold (and have an abysmal 19% rate overall from 2013-2015), there is a clear upward trend. New Directions thus emerges as a unique beacon of hope when it comes to publishing women writers in translation, suggesting that this movement may actually lead to concrete change in the near future (I will discuss this more in depth in tomorrow's post).

Finally, we have a series of publishers that not only have low average rates, not only seem to publish very few women writers in translation, not only don't really change from year to year, but also simply go entire years without publishing a single book by women in translation. Take Archipelago, which does not actually publish all that many books in translation every year (but are uniquely associated with translated literature) as an example. This is a publisher that comfortably did not publish a single book by a woman writer in translation in both 2013 and 2015. Dalkey Archive is its counter, a publisher that puts out a massive amount of literature in translation every year, yet also managed to go the entirety of 2014 without publishing a single book by a woman writer in translation (I've written about this before, of course, quite specifically). Gallic Books, Pushkin Press, and NYRB all also have at least one year in which no women in translation were published. Interestingly, for both NYRB and Gallic Books, years in which women weren't published amount to the years in which they published fewer books overall. This should not be an excuse, however; books by women in translation are not simply add-ons, with room leftover only after the men have had their chance. In the other direction, Pushkin Press published its highest number of books in 2015, the same year it published zero books by women in translation.

There is, however, important context missing behind this data. First: The wonderful Three Percent Database on which I based these numbers has its own biases, for instance the limited focus on fiction and poetry, the lack of YA/children's literature, the omission of previously released/translated titles... Several of these publishers (Pushkin, Archipelago, NYRB) publish many additional books in translation that simply aren't getting counted here. However. I looked over the catalogs of each of these publishers, specifically those books that do not make it into the Three Percent Database. The situation not only does not much improve, it often gets worse. Archipelago, for instance, has an entire publishing line specifically for children's literature, in which I found a rate of below 20% (children's literature! that field allegedly so dominated by women!). For many academic-associated publishers, the situation is far worse, as there is a huge imbalance in nonfiction translations.

W - women, M - men, B - both

These numbers are, quite frankly, enraging. They demonstrate an across-the-board lack of interest in the women in translation project, alongside the global stagnation I've described in previous posts. Publishers of literature in translation are supposed to be showing us the best that the world has to offer, but how can that possibly be true if we are only seeing a tiny fraction? (And don't forget that an overwhelming slice of these titles is from Western/Northern Europe!) Something has to change.

...and so I decided to do something about it.

To be continued.

WITMonth Day 11 | Notes on stats posts

Some thoughts:

I'm currently working on a stats post summarizing five years of data, trying to understand whether there have been any meaningful improvements over the years that WITMonth has been running and if not, in what way and why not. In the context of this effort, I would like to draw attention to a few points:

1. Several publishers are what I have referred to in previous years as "repeat offenders". As I analyze the data more carefully, it occurs to me that this title is not sufficient enough, and I am currently in the process of contacting major publishers of literature in translation who I believe have a poor track record when it comes publishing women writers in translation (in numbers, not quality of course). I think it's time to have a serious conversation about why publication rates are remaining largely stagnant, and to see how things can improve in the future.

2. The Three Percent database on which I base some of my analyses is wonderful, but it does not cover all grounds. Remember that this is a database focused on first-time US translations of fiction and poetry, excluding nonfiction, YA, kidlit, and plays. For this reason, my publishing statistics are inherently Anglo-centric. That being said, I am also trying to collect data from prominent non-US publishers of literature in translation as well, in the hopes of having some complementary data. I also typically skim the websites of major publishers myself, in order to make sure that the statistics that I publish are accurate. I'm always grateful to receive any corrections to my assessments, but please bear in mind that I publish nothing without having also double checked that the gist of it is correct.

3. Usually, the Three Percent database actually overestimates the degree to which women writers are translated into English, due to its specific limitations. Among academic publishers in particular there are dozens of retranslated "classics" published every year (almost exclusively by men), as well as nonfiction titles which are also overwhelmingly by men. I don't have the time to create my own translation data in order to properly assess all of the data, but please remember this point when looking at that 30% rate. Based on my anecdotal assessment, the real number is probably closer to 25%.

There's a lot more coming this WITMonth, and a lot more work that will need to be done throughout the year. Hold on tight...

WITMonth Day 10 | Stats (part 2)

Introduction
Much as I love the cold, hard data behind the general publishing stats when it comes to women in translation (spoiler alert: I love very little about them), there's only so much that publishing can tell us. True, publishers are a fairly major gatekeeper when it comes to the existence of women in translation (indeed, perhaps the only gatekeeper... and the reason I'll be visiting this topic again later this month), but there are many stages from the moment a book is published to the point at which it reaches the reader.

One of these is literary publications and media. Much as we would love to think that nothing affects our tastes and interests, the fact is that marketing does work. This is certainly true of book marketing, with review outlets, bloggers, and the media at large playing a huge part in how books ultimately become hits or misses. Even among indie presses, the way a book is promoted can heavily shape the way it will be sold/recommended in the future.

And so I decided to again check the status of literary reviews, to see whether the situation has improved for women in translation since 2016 (when I last checked this metric). It's pie chart time!

Methodology
Journals and review sites were selected partially on the basis of visibility within the literary community and recommendations (not a particularly scientific metric, I know), as well as ease of data collection (i.e. chronological posting, well-labeled reviews). Due to the relative limitations in translation-focused literary reviews, this may lead to certain bias simply because of the smaller range of options. This analysis is not nearly as comprehensive as that of VIDA, but is inspired by their work. All assessments done manually, so of course there is the possibility that I have made some mistake - please let me know if this is the case and I will happily make any corrections!

Results

In 2016, The Guardian presented me with a bit of a conundrum. That was the year of Elena Ferrante, with several articles going back and forth as to her identity (remember that?) and her literary merits, and a time in which Asymptote Journal had a weekly feature in the "Fiction in Translation" tag. Ultimately, I found that of reviews, 22% had been of books by women writers in translation, even as the general Fiction in Translation tag had more features and pieces about women writers (30%). This year, the metric is flipped, with only 22% of the general features, reviews, and so on about women writers in translation, but among reviews alone, that number goes up to 29%. Neither percentage, I should note is particularly good. (I should also point out that I have a very strong suspicion as to why women writers are relatively better represented now in reviews - Nicholas Lezard who used to have a column in The Guardian's book pages no longer writes there, and that column featured perhaps three women over the course of the three two I looked at it...)

The reason I start with The Guardian now (and the reason I started with it in 2016 as well) is because I can think of no other newspaper with such a prominent literary review that easily and clearly labels its forays into translated literature, while also not having a paywall. More than that, The Guardian also prominently features online, is frequently shared, and is regarded quite highly as a general book page. Think of the exposure a book reviewed in the NYT or The Guardian has as compared to a book reviewed in a niche journal - the impact of widespread publicity is huge. That The Guardian is still reviewing and featuring so few women writers in translation in their pages is deeply disappointing.

I next looked at two of the major "niche" literature in translation journals, Words Without Borders (which I had checked in 2016) and World Literature Today. While neither journal has quite the reach of a site like The Guardian, they nonetheless have tremendous influence within certain spheres and represent a lot of the brilliant content related to literature in translation. Here, I was pleasantly surprised by review rates. While Words Without Borders does not publish nearly as many reviews as it does original translations or excerpts, it is still a commanding voice when it comes to literature in translation and perhaps the first resource that most readers think of when seeking voices in translation. That their reviews are solidly split between women and men writers is absolutely thrilling, particularly in light of their mediocre rates in 2016. WWB have long supported the women in translation movement and this support is not simply words, as is evidenced both by the numbers and the improvement over time. They have made an active effort to seek out women writers from all over the world, publish them at equal rate as men writers, and, it would appear, also review them at equal rates. This is wonderful.

World Literature Today, meanwhile, (which has significantly more reviews over the same one-year period) is a more complicated situation. 36% is the frustrating zone of "I see that you're slightly better than average, but is this really all I'll settle for?", where ultimately - this is still not a great rate, but it's just a teensy bit better than the industry standard of 30%. It's where WWB was two years ago. With a stunning 83 reviews over a one-year period (significantly more than any other review outlet I examined), WLT has tremendous potential to shift the focus to a more balanced playing field and give exposure to dozens of women writers in translation. I hope they improve on this matter in the future, following in WWB's footsteps.

The next tier was popular online reviews, sites clearly associated with literature in translation that also publish reviews, again ones that I had looked at in 2016. Here, neither result is particularly thrilling. Three Percent is the blog-arm of publisher Open Letter (and where I get all the amazing raw data for my publishing stat posts!), which itself publishes a fair amount of women in translation (but has never reached 50% in a single year I've counted, always clocking in somewhere between 30-40%). The dissonance between a blog praised for its role in the women in translation movement (by virtue of their database, and I'll admit that having gender added has made my life significantly easier than back in 2013 when I went through title by title and added author genders myself!) and a 17% rate of review of books by women writers in translation is jarring, and it should be, especially since that number reflects a significant drop from 2016's 31%. It indicates an additional gender bias beyond the publishing imbalance, one that I do not think reflects well on any publication or review.

And then again, we have a flip: Asymptote, which had a 22% rate in 2016, has now moderately improved that rate to 29%. Neither rate is particularly good, of course, and again there's this significant conceptual gap between how Asymptote present themselves in terms of the women in translation project and how they actually review books.

Finally, I took to Twitter to ask for recommendations of literary journals that review international titles. I ultimately chose three journals for my assessment (again, mostly based on scope, comfort, and accessibility): Latin American Literature Today, Literary Review, and Reading in Translation. None of the three presented with particularly thrilling rates of review, again serving as a disappointing reminder that the bias against women writers in translation (or women writers in languages other than English, more accurately) is pervasive and widespread. It's not a few bad apples; the entire orchard is tilted.

Discussion
I won't pretend that I'm not largely disappointed by rates that I see. Words Without Borders is a thrilling exception, but it should not be an exception. Having parity is not an unreasonable demand, nor is expecting literary journals to more carefully curate which books they promote. Considering the degree of unknown books I encountered in the last three entries (particularly the Literary Review, which included a lot of nonfiction) and how dominated literature in translation is by independent presses, this is not simply the fault of pushy marketing executives at corporate publishers. Every review we write is a choice of a single book out of hundreds published each year, and journals may choose whether they review significantly more works by men writers than by women. It may not be easy, but one simply has to look at WWB to see how it's done - no fuss, no issue, no grandstanding. Just interesting, thoughtful, and insightful reviews of books by women writers at equal rates as men writers. It's that easy.



Raw data

WITMonth Day 2 | Stats (part 1)

Introduction
There is a sense that statistic posts are useless when it comes to the women in translation project. Indeed, if you check my "stats" tag on this blog, you'll notice that I entirely avoided the concept in 2017, opting instead to focus on reviews and lower-key discussion posts during WITMonth. Yet here we are in 2018. The Fifth Annual #WITMonth.

I began this project with statistics. Frankly, it was only by seeing the numbers in black against white that made me realize just how pervasive the problem was. It wasn't just my reading that was skewed, the entire system seemed entirely biased against women. The statistics helped me realize that something more had to be done, and with the help of several other members of this community, WITMonth was born.

There is a sense that statistic posts are useless.

I look at the statistics from 2017. I look at the statistics from 2015. I look at the statistics from 2014. From 2013 (the first year for which I conducted a comprehensive analysis). The numbers are largely static. In fact, the numbers are depressingly static, with little variation even within the various metrics I showcase.

After five years of advocating for this cause, I find myself feeling, not for the first time, that the work I do here is useless. After all, the most prominent publishers continue to insist that there is no real problem, at least the problem isn't theirs, at least the problem isn't really a problem. Others simply ignore the matter, as though by dismissing reader concerns, they can dismiss the problem entirely (I will discuss this further later in the month). But the numbers don't lie.

Methodology
As with previous years, I rely on the excellent work of Three Percent, using their database (now updated to include author and translator gender). All analyses my own.

Results
The first metric I always check is the simplest: what is the basic breakdown of books in translation, by men and women (and other).

As you can see, balance is still a far way off, with women comprising only 31% of new translations into English.  

The second basic metric I like to check is a regional assessment. As you can see below, the general skew towards translations of European literature remains pervasive. Not only does Europe make up more than half of all translations, it also showcases just how stark the divide is between publication of books by men and women, as well as the fact that excuses such as "there aren't many women writers over there" is simply a false, racist argument (and I have heard such excuses many times; I will continue to reject them offhand).

Another notable observation from this chart is the depressingly low rate of translations emerging from African countries. While this can somewhat be explained by the fact that some African writers use English as their primary language, it is still a huge oversight from the industry at large. There is also a missed opportunity here to explore a wider range of languages, not simply French or Arabic - Africa is a continent teeming with diversity of language and culture. There are countless older (and newer) texts that reflect this diversity, and not simply by men writers. These works deserve as much attention as classics from all other countries and cultures.

It is also worth noting a lack of diversity within certain continental designations. Recall that Asia is a huge, hugely populous continent, spanning several discretely different regions and cultures. Yet the literature translated out of these regions remains oddly homogeneous, with very few books published out of Southeast Asian or Central Asian countries. Curiously, women writers in translation were actually somewhat better represented in this regard, with two Indonesian titles translated (more interestingly, these were among the only non-European books published by AmazonCrossing - we'll get to that in a moment), an Armenian title, and a Saudi Arabian book as well. Yet the baffling absence of Indian books published in English remains from year to year, especially noticeable in the almost complete lack of Indian women writers getting translated/published.

Since I've already mentioned it, one of the other metrics I like to look at is AmazonCrossing's place in publishing. What was once a relatively ignored publisher of literature in translation has recently become a powerhouse, consistently publishing the highest number of books in translation from year to year. AmazonCrossing is also consistently one of the few publishers to publish more women writers than men writers in translation; 2017 is no exception. Yet what is so utterly shocking about AmazonCrossing's role in publishing women writers in translation is how much worse the landscape would be without them. Without AmazonCrossing, share of women writers in translation out of all translations dips from that already-not-so-great 31% to 28%; men writers are relatively "strengthened" from 65% to 69%. This becomes easily apparent when looking at how large a fraction AmazonCrossing represents for men versus women, as you can see in the chart below. One publisher is responsible for more than 20% of the books by women writers. That's... not okay.

If we look at publishers in general, the same old story emerges. AmazonCrossing is one of only two publishers within the top ten publishers that reaches or crosses the 50% mark. The other is the significantly smaller press Deep Vellum.

Here, I find myself needing to point out an added injustice of the awful statistics. Of course it's easy to see the absurd imbalances in publishing when laid out so starkly, not simply among smaller independent presses but also among the most established translators of literature in translation. But what is most upsetting in this chart (for me, at least) is that several of the publishers here with some of the worst publication rates have frequently attempted to capitalize on the women in translation project for their own sales, in what feels like cynicism at its worst. Moreover, the fact that certain publishers among the yearly top ten continue to refuse to engage in the conversation at all (indeed, often dismissing it outright) is similarly disappointing, as their ratios almost stubbornly refuse to balance out between men and women writers. There comes a point when I can no longer excuse the lack of improvement as simple ignorance; there are publishers that are well aware of the fact that they do not publish women writers, and they do not appear to care. This is a problem.

Discussion

Here is what it is truly angering about every one of the charts above - they look almost identical to the charts I've published from previous years. Publishers like Dalkey Archive, Seagull Books, New Directions, and NYRB have had extremely low rate of publishing women writers in translation (indeed, of publishing women writers at all) for several years now. AmazonCrossing has been the primary support system for publishing women writers in translation for several years now. The base rate of translation of books by women writers has hovered around 30% for several years now. The completely disproportionate preference for publishing books by European writers rather than literally any other place on Earth has existed for several years now. Nothing of what I am sharing is new.

It could be argued that if there is nothing new in my data, I should not publish. Certainly, if this was a scientific paper of the sort I write at work, there would be nothing to report and I would have saved myself the effort of this work. Yet what we're talking about here is a distinctly static problem that is, shockingly enough, not getting better. Women writers in translation may be getting more attention these days as a result of the broader range of WITMonth and the women in translation project at large (and I'll discuss this point more in depth in part 2 of the stats posts), but for writers who have yet to be translated, the situation is not improving. 

There is still significant bias against women writers in translation. There are still sexist publishers. (Yes, sexist publishers. While there's plenty of unconscious bias, there is also a lot of plainspoken sexism. Do not hide from it.) We are still being cheated out of countless brilliant books by women writers that simply aren't getting their due.

After five years, something has to change.

WITMonth Day 18 | Reviews of women in translation | Stats

After several years of anecdotal references, hand-waving and uncertainty, it's about time we figure out what's happening on the end of review outlets when it comes to women writers in translation. Let's dive in, shall we?

Methodology

I looked at only a very small sample of review outlets, attempting more to gauge an impression of the existing situation than the sort of truly representative work that outlets like VIDA do. The four journals I focused on were Three Percent Review, The Guardian (features and reviews separately), Asymptote, and Words Without Borders. These four were chosen based on my familiarity with them more than anything and may as a result have led to somewhat biased results. All data collected is from August 2015 through August 2016 (WITMonth to WITMonth, basically).

The three possible outcomes

There are three scenarios in terms of review rates:

1. The standard 30%/70% publishing ratio. While a typically low rate, this would indicate that the outlet effectively "samples at random". There is neither an attempt at corrective discrimination, nor any additional bias being taken into account.
2. Women in translation at a higher rate than the publishing average of 30%. This would probably indicate awareness on the side of the review outlet and an attempt to "correct" the problematic rates, seeking at the very least media parity.
3. Women in translation at a lower rate than the publishing average of 30%. This indicates an outlet that includes a further level of bias against women writers, beyond a random sampling. This could be as the result of biased perceptions when it comes to "quality literature", similar to the overall review bias found by VIDA.

The Guardian - Reviews and Features

I began by looking at The Guardian's "Literature in Translation" section first, largely because of their literary prominence and visibility in the literary world. I decided to distinguish between specifically defined reviews and features/news articles fairly early in collecting my data. This came about when I noticed that Elena Ferrante's name seemed to crop up a disproportionate amount. Indeed, I soon realized that the Guardian's results skewed heavily if each feature on Elena Ferrante was counted as a separate piece focusing on women writers: Ferrante featured in no less than seven pieces, whether discussing her popularity or her actual origins (is she a man?! no?!) or the books themselves (less common). Two other authors also featured double (superstar Haruki Murakami and Chen Xue whose work appeared twice in Asymptote's Translation Tuesday series).

Thus looking only at authors featured, we see a fairly predictable distribution: 30% women writers, 70% men writers. I soon realized, however, that Asymptote's not-quite weekly feature seemed to have more women writers than average. Indeed, the Translation Tuesday series had a 41% publication rate for women. Adjusting for this "tilt", I checked the features again without this one series: the ratio plummets to 21%.

The situation did not improve much in reviews. Out of 41 reviews of literature in translation, only 22% were of books written by women writers. Here there was no need to skew or adjust, quite simply: The Guardian reviews fewer women writers in translation than men. Beyond the industry bias, The Guardian employs further hurdles for women writers in translation, leading to reduced visibility and awareness. (This despite the fact that they have featured two articles specifically on the matter of women writers in translation, non-author-specific articles which were included in the features count.)

Three Percent Review

While Three Percent Review does not have the same visibility or popularity of The Guardian, Three Percent is highly regarded in the world of literature in translation. Furthermore, the site has discussed the imbalance in publishing women writers in translation themselves. It seemed only fitting to see how they did. It turns out that the Three Percent Review follows the industry standard almost perfectly, even including the 8% of titles by various authors. Three Percent Review is the epitome of option number one as described above: They display a perfect random sampling of the existing bias. No more, no less.

Asymptote Journal

After noting Asymptote's high translation rate of short stories and excerpts in The Guardian, I decided to check their actual reviews page. Here, it turned out, they do a significantly poorer job, clocking in at a low 22%. This result surprised me after the pleasantly corrective Translation Tuesday rates at the Guardian. Different editors, perhaps?

Words Without Borders

Finally, I checked one of the most central websites for literature in translation: Words Without Borders. WWB is the site that many consider to have launched the discussion about women writers in translation (with Alison Anderson's original piece in 2013), and they recently posted their own WITMonth reading list. The rate here is a bit dull: 35% is slightly better than the industry average, but it doesn't quite wash away the bad taste of a huge imbalance. While I didn't look at their features and every article in every issue (I encourage any intrepid readers to map that out!), my impression is again of a site that takes what is offered. Despite honest attempts to find women writers from around the world (and WWB do seek to include women writers even when looking at more "difficult" regions of the world), they're just not able to break through that ratio.

What these results mean

Once again, I should note that it's difficult to claim these results as representative when I sampled only four review outlets. Unfortunately, I do not have the resources at hand that an organization like VIDA utilizes, nor the time to fully analyze the results to the levels that I would like.

But as always, a pattern emerges that does not bode well for the women in translation movement. The fact that review outlets are not attempting at the very least to even the playing field in terms of publicity is disappointing, though it may not be their fault. We ask ourselves: what books are publishers promoting or sending for review? Furthermore, the sloppy way in which some outlets review their women writers is even more depressing. In one Guardian review, the reviewer noted with subtle sexism: "There is something about the way Hochet presents us with the mental processes of a rootless 45-year-old womaniser that suggests a writer of unusual ability. These days, authors seem to stick to speaking for their own gender more than they used to."

It's disappointing to see this imbalance, but it represents another area in which we simply need to try a bit harder. For literature in translation reviews inherently pick from a smaller pool of books than those that are written in English. We know that the good books by women are out there (and indeed I noticed that many fan-favorites among WITMonth book bloggers did not make the "official" review cut in these outlets) and we know that it's possible to reach 20 excellent books by women writers alongside 20 excellent books by men writers. Parity - at this stage, at least - is entirely possible.