Canadian publishers get down to business at the Canada Council’s Translation …
Canadian publishers get down to business at the Canada Council’s Translation Rights Fair
With the Canada Council for the Arts hosting its second translation rights fair on Friday, more than 65 English- and French-language publishers and literary agents from across Canada are converging at the Hotel Omni Mont-Royal in Montreal for a full day of discussions around buying and selling translation rights.
The focus of this year’s fair is squarely on business. A Thursday night reception aside, organizers have set aside most of Friday for pre-arranged meetings.
According to Gillian Fizet, rights manager at House of Anansi Press and Groundwood Books, the program has meant more meetings with potential buyers than at last year’s inaugural fair in Ottawa, a small change that suits her just fine. “For me, the aim here is to go and meet as many new people as possible,” she says.
Last year, a meeting with Montreal’s Éditions Fides led Fizel to sell the Quebec company French-language rights to The Cello Suites: J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece by Eric Siblin. Anansi’s acquisition of The Blue Dragon by Robert Lepage, published in French by Éditions Alto, also came out of the event.
On Friday, Fizet hopes to garner interest for titles such as Dr. Brinkley’s Tower by Robert Hough, forthcoming from Anansi next month, as well as Groundwood titles A Few Blocks by Cybèle Young and No Ordinary Day by Deborah Ellis.
John Calabro, co-publisher at Toronto’s Quattro Press, returns to the fair in hopes of replicating last year’s success, when he acquired translation rights to Hubert Aquin’s L’invention de la mort from Leméac Éditeur and to Patrick Senécal’s novella Contre Dieu from Éditions Les 400 Coups. Against God comes out in April and will be the first English-language translation of the best-selling Quebecois horror writer’s work.
Calabro says that by attending the fair he’s gained valuable insight into exciting writers in Quebec’s literary scene. “I’m enjoying this … direction because I feel like we’re filling, in a tiny way, this gap,” Calabro says.
The event also provides a space for Canadian translators to network with publishers. The Literary Translators’ Association of Canada will be among the agencies staffing a table at the fair. As with the previous fair, LTAC president Jo-Anne Elder says the organization’s aim is to provide publishers with information about where to find qualified translators, how to negotiate contracts with translators, and expectations regarding working conditions, timing, and additional services.
The rights fairs are a component of the $5-million National Translation Program for Book Publishing. In addition to encouraging cross-cultural partnerships between English- and French-language publishers in Canada, the events serve to promote the Canada Council’s translation grant program, which offers up to $25,000 to cover the costs associated with translating books between the official languages.
The third and final fair will be held in Toronto next year.
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