oh don't worry about (disregard) the Mali book Chris. that was just something i was looking at after some chatting with Aomame. i just posted that there for Aomame and anyone else to have a look if interested.

I think we should have this foreign book discussion start March 1st as opposed to February 1st. Look at the main forums page for a second. http://www.booktalk.org/forum.html We currently are reading and discussing 4 fiction books and only 2 non-fiction books. As a matter of fact I just moved "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" to the Archives. So before that move we had 5 fiction books on the menu and only 2 non-fiction. We're lop-sided.

I am proposing we keep this thread going and build up a list of maybe 5 - 10 foreign fiction books. The poll can be created soon, but we probably need to allow the poll to run for a full 2 weeks in order to get enough people active and interested in this new idea. So keep researching. I am seeing lots of sites that list foreign books translated into English. The key is to weed through them and find 5 - 10 books that would make for interesting group discussion.

Great topic and question, Chris! I think that one of the principal reasons for the small number of works translated into English from other cultures is the publishing practice in USA and UK. Major publishers are mainly interested in the market and the profit, so they are not too keen on translating and publishing a work that won't be sold in many copies. I don't know, maybe I am wrong.
And, since you mentioned that you would like to see some titles from other languages, here is one I really adore: The Damned Yard, by Ivo Andric. A truly inspiring and thrilling novel..

tomrosemasters, this looks more like a book of short stories than a novel. But this is OK too. We'll add it to the poll which will go up soon. I'm still researching and looking for highly praised fiction books to add to the poll. We want 5 - 10 total.

Yes, unfortunately they created a confusion but putting together a novel with several short stories. The Damned Yard is a short novel, and the rest are short stories. I think they printed it all together because they wanted to promote more of Andric's work.

I'm ready to post the poll!

The 10 books I've uncovered are from these countries...

1. Ireland
2. Spain
3. Turkey
4. Denmark
5. Japan
6. Brazil
7. Norway
8. Italy
9. France
10. Iceland

I hope to get the poll up in the next day or two. We'll let it run for 2 weeks or more and have the discussion start March 1st.

The reason? Well, look at the statistics in the original message for this subject. Or, still better (worse), one has only to look at the pitiful status of geography and intl. history performance of our students. With so genraluzed level of ignorance, how do we manage to be, or remain, at the top, or near the top, of powerful countries of the world.
Languages? Spanish for starters, but if we take a look at European book reviews, very easy to look at the British newspapers, one could get some ideas. The Guardian is almost perfect in that respect.

What a fantastic idea and then thread -- so exciting!

The poll is now up so please vote!