Book suggestions in languages other than English

Suggest and discuss books to read (all languages welcome!)
phileasfogg
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Post by phileasfogg »

Hello everybody. I have a question . I found in a Library (and scanned it) the first spanish translation of "The metamorphosis" by Franz Kafka. It was published in Revista de Ocidente (a cultural magazine directed by Ortega y Gasset) in 1925. The translator is unknown and is one of the great mysteries in the translations of that author, but in the magazine the text is unsigned and the archives of that magazine in Madrid were burnt during the civil war so we won´t never know who was the original translator . Should i wait until to 2021 or 2022 to read it? Or am I wrong?
Last edited by phileasfogg on June 13th, 2019, 12:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.
One book to rule them all and in the Public Domain bind them
Rapunzelina
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Post by Rapunzelina »

It's safe for you now in Argentina, and it will be safe for Librivox in 2021.

(By safe, I mean in the public domain)
phileasfogg
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Post by phileasfogg »

Thanks!!I´ll wait as Shelob knitting my web until 2021
One book to rule them all and in the Public Domain bind them
dchucks
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Post by dchucks »

Can an audio version of this Kabuliwala (Hindi translation) be done? https://archive.org/details/Kabuliwala-Hindi-RabindranathTagore/page/n5/mode/2up
Please do take a listen at my Hindi podcast at http://www.Podbharati.com
schrm
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Post by schrm »

dchucks wrote: July 7th, 2020, 9:12 am Can an audio version of this Kabuliwala (Hindi translation) be done? https://archive.org/details/Kabuliwala-Hindi-RabindranathTagore/page/n5/mode/2up
https://archive.org/details/Kabuliwala-Hindi-RabindranathTagore/page/n1/mode/2up
this is the link to the frst page of the book.

there are two dates, 2005 and 2010
is that the year of print?
the source has to be pd in your country and in the usa.
so i'm sorry: no!
to be public domain in the usa, the source has to be printed before 1924.
cheers
wolfi
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Post by Kazbek »

dchucks wrote: July 7th, 2020, 9:12 am Can an audio version of this Kabuliwala (Hindi translation) be done? https://archive.org/details/Kabuliwala-Hindi-RabindranathTagore/page/n5/mode/2up
As schrm explained above, we generally can't use texts published less than 95 years ago (after 1924) due to public domain rules. Earlier publications in Hindi may be hard to find. Perhaps there's a digitization program of old texts in India with a catalog that you can browse online. If not, your best bet would probably be to go to HathiTrust.org and do an advanced search with 3 filters:

Language: Hindi
Mode: Full View
Published: before 1924

This returns 257 results:

https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Search/Home?adv=1&yop=before&ft=ft&fqor-language%5B%5D=Hindi&fqrange-end-publishDateTrie-1=1924

Not all of them actually contain Hindi text, but some do. Good luck!

Michael
Bookerina
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Post by Bookerina »

Hey there,
wouldnt it be cool to also have books from outside of the western world?
Like classics from an African Country? Many countries there were colonized so they should have literature in French or English. Maybe even in German.
Or maybe also South America. I know a few peruvian Authors like: Mario Vargas Llosa or José Maria Arguedas.
It s just an idea
annise
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Post by annise »

We accept books from anywhere as long as they are PD in the USA and someone wants to read them, we don't discriminate. But the problem often is to find the books - there are lots of books based in Africa for example - but they are mostly written by Europeans not natives and tend to be of the "deepest darkest Africa" type. So yes it would be nice to have them.

Anne
schrm
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Post by schrm »

Bookerina wrote: July 29th, 2020, 4:54 am Hey there,
wouldnt it be cool to also have books from outside of the western world?
Like classics from an African Country? Many countries there were colonized so they should have literature in French or English. Maybe even in German.
Or maybe also South America. I know a few peruvian Authors like: Mario Vargas Llosa or José Maria Arguedas.
It s just an idea
Mario Vargas Llosa was born 1936, so (most likely) no text of him is pd in the usa. usa copyright is a rolling model and this year, the work has to be published in 1924 or before. and llosa is still living, so (most likely) his works are not pd - nowhere outside of the usa.
José María Arguedas was born 1911. he published his first work in 1935 "Los escoleros. Warma kuyay." he died 1969. there are some countries with a copyright "year of death plus 50", but for most countries, not pd.

so, i was wondering:
is your suggestion not a "book-to-read suggestion", but a question for works in our catalogue?
there are some books in the catalogue, which could be to your liking.

this one, eg, ist the biography of a slave, who fled.
https://librivox.org/biography-of-mahommah-g-baquaqua-by-samuel-downing-moore/
his bio in wikipedia is interesting, also: he became christian, went back to africa as a missionary, and was neevr seen again.

a book, which i found and deem interesting, is heart of darkness 8we have at least two versions in the catalogue):
https://librivox.org/heart-of-darkness-version-2-by-joseph-conrad/
"Heart of Darkness exposes the dark side of European colonization while exploring the three levels of darkness that the protagonist, Marlow, encounters: the darkness of the Congo wilderness, the darkness of the Europeans' cruel treatment of the African natives, and the unfathomable darkness within every human being for committing heinous acts of evil."

we do have english, but non-western works in the catalogue from asia (especially china and japan), a few from arabic areas ( https://librivox.org/the-arabian-nights-entertainments-volume-01-by-anonymous/ https://librivox.org/the-book-of-a-thousand-nights-and-a-night-volume-01-by-anonymous/ )...
and regarding south america: there are journey diaries, texts from authors, and so on - but mostly in other languages.

regarding literature of latin-america, i recommend to look for the country-names. i'm sure, you will find some works!

last but not least, the news-blog on the main page of librivox makes a world tour (this was done before) and shows some booktitles for every area of the world. the blog mentions authors of that areas, but also stories about that area.
mainly, that are works, which our mc's catalogued since the last world tour.
https://librivox.org/category/blog/
so far, baltic states, africa 1+2 and southern and central america were published this year.

maybe i could help,

cheers
cheers
wolfi
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RRRRREBECCA
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Post by RRRRREBECCA »

Hi, I'd like to suggest a Chinese book names Zhuangzi, written by Zhuang Zhou. The book perfectly combines anecdotes, fables, and elementary rule of the world. The book involves a lot of unreal short stories, some sounds like a night dream but illuminates a lot. The author offers a unique perspective of death and life, based on the social reality during the War. The life and death in the cognitive world are treated as equal, life is even better than death in real life as both of them are unknown at the level of life, and finally it reaches beyond a dilemma. The author also discussed destiny dilemma in the chapter. Regarding the entrapment of life's destiny, Zhuangzi suggests to lead the world on a road of "safety" which by taking care of everything that fate has arranged, regardless happiness or sadness. He also mentioned life of "one with Tao" in the book as a wisdom to accepting and conforming the world undoubtedly.
For any reference, it's a good choice to read the book with finished footnotes and commentaries, especially for the first time reading!
RRRRREBECCA
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Post by RRRRREBECCA »

Hi guys, I'd like to recommend a Chinese book named To Live written by an amazing Chinese writer Yuhua. The novel tells a tragic story of a rural family. The protagonist named Fugui, a rich young man who was addicted to gambling. The bad habits finally cost the family's business. The old father was unexpectedly pissed off by him, and his mother was seriously ill and urgently need life-saving medicine. Fugui was press-ganged by the army on his way to the clinic. It took years for him to return home and fund his mother already passed away. More tragically, Fugui gradually lost his wife, children and grandson. In the end, only an old cow accompanied old Fugui, but the old man was still alive, as if he were more free and strong than ever.
RRRRREBECCA
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Post by RRRRREBECCA »

I'd like to recommend an impressive fiction novel, The Three-Body Problem. The book contains three parts, Three-body, Three-body II·Dark Forest, Three-body III·Eternal Life of Death. As a writer with senior engineering experience, the author successfully build a Trisolaran world, caused by an accidental interstellar communication during the Cultural Revolution, and the grievances between human civilization and Trisolaris for more than 300 years. After the publication of the Trilogy, the trilogy is very popular and has been well received by readers and mainstream media. It is generally regarded as a milestone in Chinese science fiction literature and has established a new height for Chinese science fiction.

This three-body trilogy won the special award of the China Science Fiction "Galaxy Award" and the Global Chinese Science Fiction "Nebula Award" for the best feature story.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three-Body_Problem_(novel)
Availle
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Post by Availle »

Hi there and welcome to LibriVox!
RRRRREBECCA wrote: August 1st, 2020, 7:43 pm Hi, I'd like to suggest a Chinese book names Zhuangzi, written by Zhuang Zhou.
Which we already have in the catalog in an English version: https://librivox.org/musings-of-a-chinese-mystic-by-lionel-giles/
But a Chinese version would be very welcome!

RRRRREBECCA wrote: August 1st, 2020, 8:48 pm I'd like to recommend an impressive fiction novel, The Three-Body Problem.
The work was serialized in Science Fiction World in 2006 and published as a book in 2008. And is thus not in the Public Domain and cannot be recorded for LibriVox.
RRRRREBECCA wrote: August 1st, 2020, 8:16 pm Hi guys, I'd like to recommend a Chinese book named To Live written by an amazing Chinese writer Yuhua.
To Live (simplified Chinese: 活着; traditional Chinese: 活著; pinyin: Huózhe) is a novel written by Chinese novelist Yu Hua in 1993. And is thus not in the Public Domain and cannot be recorded for LibriVox.

In general, book are in the public domain in the US (and therefore, recordable for LibriVox) if they have been published at least 95 years ago. Modern books published after that and in particular when the author is still alive, are not public domain in general.
Cheers, Ava.
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RRRRREBECCA
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Post by RRRRREBECCA »

Tao Te Ching--Lao Tzu(author)--516 BC
This famous Chinese book mainly expounds the thought of natural inaction, which contains a lot of simple dialectical views of the transformation of opposites. In terms of form, this book is a quotation style verse with concise language and many parallel sentences. The author focused on Tao follows nature which contains three elements, Tao, Law and Germany. As the most abstract concept in the book, Tao works as the power source for the whole heaven. Law shares similar elements with Tao, but highlight the importance of natural rule and reverse function. "Germany" is the further development of "Tao" in the field of morality. All three of these concepts cover people's personal development, social behavior and relationship with nature.
links:http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7337
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Post by Availle »

RRRRREBECCA wrote: August 1st, 2020, 10:08 pm Tao Te Ching--Lao Tzu(author)--516 BC
Two version in English, one in German in the catalog. Chinese still missing:
https://librivox.org/author/4205
Cheers, Ava.
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