Tuesday, 30 November 2010

Owls, Butterflies, Nudes

While trying (and failing) to track down something both in print and in English by an apparently amazing Austro-Hungarian writer named Géza Csáth (and if he's as good as his cousin, Dezső Kosztolányi, then he's very good indeed), I did find these two French translation covers, from the Arbre Vengeur imprint. Illustrators unknown, but I like them a lot, especially the owl-woman.



So here we have another French imprint which (usually) limits the artwork on their covers to a circle.
at

8 comments:

  1. Chasch1 December 2010 at 02:46

    These images remind me of the funky covers from another french publisher called Les Allusifs. I believe they mostly publish translations (Maya Angelou, Mavis Gallant, Bolano...) Instead of the image being in a circle, they draw a circle around their titles!

    http://www.lesallusifs.com/livres/librairie.php?sort=dateparu&order=DESC&catalog=tous&page=3

    ReplyDelete
  2. Will1 December 2010 at 07:23

    Nice. There are at least two books in English -- stories and a diary. Check out the diary excerpt in this old AJRMS post.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Will1 December 2010 at 07:25

    But "in print"... -- good luck! The story volume should be in the $15 range used.

    ReplyDelete
  4. JRSM1 December 2010 at 13:27

    Chasch: Thank you--there are some lovely covers in that series. I might have to post on them soon. Great find!

    Will: Yes, it was the 'in print' bit that was causing me problems. I've ordered 'Opium' second-hand, so thats a start. I really hope it has those engravings, but I doubt it will.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ákos Polgárdi1 December 2010 at 23:35

    I don't think Csáth even comes close to Kosztolányi, but he certainly was an interesting figure with a fascinating biography. Also, there was a kind of myth wowen around him during the socialist era when publishing his works wasn't very much supported by the regime so his Diary etc. became something like samizdat literature. Fortunately we now have the entire Nachlass published by a proper publishing house. Thanks for the covers.

    ReplyDelete
  6. JRSM2 December 2010 at 00:20

    Thank you for that, Ákos. My limited exposure to Kosztolányi ('Skylark' and 'Anna Edes') suggest that he's brilliant, so it would be hard for anyone else to match up. The diaries do sound fascinating.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Ákos Polgárdi2 December 2010 at 10:59

    I think you're right about that. And it should probably get mentioned that Kosztolányi excelled in poetry and short stories as well (as a matter of fact I prefer these to his novels, although Édes Anna is great). As for Csáth, he actually started his literary career writing music criticism, and I guess you could say that he was among the first in medical circles who took Freud seriously.

    ReplyDelete
  8. JRSM2 December 2010 at 13:43

    Now I just need someone to translate Kosztolányi's short fiction. George Szirtes, get onto it!

    ReplyDelete