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Switzerland

Curved asphalt road on a foggy day in Lebanon
Photo by Dorsa Masghati on Unsplash
A Child’s Smile
By Jadd Hilal
After a dozen or so bombings, Jahid, like my mother had before him, decided we would flee.
Translated from French by Lara Vergnaud
Multilingual
The covers of the books in the December Watchlist: Glossolalia, On the Isle of Antioch, The Archive...
The Watchlist: December 2023
By Tobias Carroll
Tobias Carroll recommends six new books you won’t want to miss this month, from a Brazilian crime novel to poetry translated from Filipino and Serbian.
2023-07-City-and-Writer-Dana-Grigorcea-Feature.jpeg
Credit: Mardiana Sani
The City and the Writer: In Zürich with Dana Grigorcea
By Nathalie Handal
In Switzerland people tend to be reticent, but reticence is—from both literary and theoretical perspectives—the best starting point for sudden passion.
Translated from German by Alta L. Price
two rows of people playing pachinko
Tischbeinahe, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
The Pachinko Parlor
By Elisa Shua Dusapin
“Do you know what your grandmother’s mother did to avoid being subjected to speaking Japanese at school? She sliced off part of her own tongue.”
Translated from French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins
Road Stories: International Writing on Travel
By Susan Harris
Some of the writers here document their own trips, while others invent characters and send them on the road.
From “Staying Gone”
By Ulrike Ulrich
She wonders why she’s doing this to herself. Is it supposed to be some kind of test?
Translated from German by Anne Posten
Multimedia
Found on the Tracks: European Writing on Train Travel
By Anne Posten
Trains . . . unite many dichotomies: the exotic and the banal, freedom and luxury, nostalgia and modernity, the possible and the real.
Fish Television
By Peter Weber
I was clouds transforming, a sinking billow.
Translated from German by Anne Posten
The Avenging Whip
By Max Lobe
In my line of business, people don't talk much.
Translated from French by Ros Schwartz
Dear Torturer
By Erwin Koch
Evil wears no gloves.
Translated from German by John K. Cox
The Man in the Travel Trailer
By André Kaminski
He has ten canisters of gasoline and if need be, could escape to North Africa via Malaga and Algeciras without stopping at a pump.
Translated from German by Ingrid Lansford
Summer
By Mercè Rodoreda
She stopped in front of a shop window full of umbrellas, and her friend, who was walking ahead of her, suddenly turned around: Carme, we'll get separated!
Translated from Catalan by Martha Tennent
Happiness
By Mercè Rodoreda
Last night, before falling asleep, she had realized winter was almost over.
Translated from Catalan by Martha Tennent
Ice Cream
By Mercè Rodoreda
He had bought two ice creams and with a sad look on his face was offering them to her so she could choose.
Translated from Catalan by Martha Tennent
Calligraphy Lesson
By Mikhail Shishkin
Good God, what criminals? They're ordinary people.
Translated from Russian by Marian Schwartz
Friends
By Tirdad Zolghadr
A warden takes me by the arm as I slip on my blindfold and step out of the cell.
From “Wanderings”
By Isabelle Eberhardt
It was the chosen hour, that marvelous hour in the country of Africa, when the great fiery sun is going to finally disappear, leaving the earth to rest in the blue shadow of the night.
Translated from French by Melissa Marcus
The Sultan’s Flotilla
By Sadiq Neihoum
The dog was a hideous sight, putrid, offensive, with gouged-out eyes.
Translated from Arabic by Ethan Chorin
From “Fever”
By Friedrich Glauser
The only sound to be heard in the little room was the snoring of the landlord interspersed with the quiet tick-tock of the clock on the wall...
Translated from German by Mike Mitchell
Then
By Yang Lian
then you go on dying dying in plasterthen the pitch-black snow inside the womb goes on fallingthen the face is not while burning pain on the face iswound is not while the ripe age preserved by beheading…
Translated from Chinese by Brian Holton & Agnes Hung-Chong Chan
Since
By Yang Lian
what wraps two dripping fruit segments wraps a present too / since solitude became your food
Translated from Chinese by Brian Holton & Agnes Hung-Chong Chan
Until
By Yang Lian
like a scream expanding its territory until tonight
Translated from Chinese by Brian Holton & Agnes Hung-Chong Chan