Stories From Sweden
Modern Culture’s Martin Colthorpe on bringing Swedish literature to UK and Irish festival and event stages
interviewed by Alex Fleming
As interest in translated literature grows, UK and Irish literary festivals are exploring new ways to foreground international authors and the art of translation. As long-standing champions of the role of translations – and translators – in the literary landscape, Modern Culture have taken an active part in this work.
In this interview with Swedish Book Review, Martin Colthorpe, founder of Modern Culture, discusses the role of literary festivals in the publishing world today, changing attitudes to literary translation, and a new project that hopes to raise the profile of Swedish literature internationally.
SBR: As an agency, Modern Culture specialises in events and festival programming in literature, film and the arts. Could you tell us a little bit about your work, and how this fits into the translation ecosphere in particular?
Martin Colthorpe: I set up Modern Culture in 2012, following 10 years working at Southbank Centre on the live literature programme. As a freelance programmer, I had fairly broad ambitions about the work I wanted to do, but with an idea that I wanted to work cross-artform and with international writers: essentially, as a freelance programmer I had to look beyond the mainstream. My first major freelance project was called Japan Now, which united both of these ambitions. We did events with writers and translators, but also brought them into dialogue with Japanese artists working in film and photography. Through Japan Now, I began to learn much more about translation, and how integral translators are to the international publishing scene. The next big projects that Modern Culture took on were New Dutch Writing and then Flip Through Flanders, two big campaigns promoting translated literature across the UK and Ireland. Again, the integral role that translators play almost as agents for writers in the source language made a big impression on me. In both of these projects, translators have been heavily involved, leading workshops, speaking on stage at festivals, doing readings for children and young people and mentoring emerging translators.
Your past projects encompass a huge range of language areas and disciplines. When programming for UK events, where do you begin? How do you approach what might work well for a given audience or interest group?
There’s a huge range of literature and book festivals across the UK and Ireland, and they each have their own personality and their own particular strengths and weaknesses. They also have certain commonalities… most festivals want to welcome the biggest international names in any publishing season, and certain festivals, because of their cache and their dates, have a bigger chance of landing them.
Equally, towns and cities have their own unique demographic, and this, combined with the tastes of the festival programmer and their appetite for risk, helps determine the flavour of the festival programme. Take Norwich for example… This was England’s first UNESCO City of Literature, and it's home to the National Centre for Writing and British Centre for Literary Translation, so it has a long tradition of welcoming international writers and translators. But what’s less well known is that it’s also a hub for Japanese Studies, with the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Art and Culture based in the city. So Norwich was a great place for me to programme Japan Now events. At the other side of the country, Bristol has established itself as a great location for events with international authors and translators, built on the burgeoning independent bookshop scene, which has done so much to promote independent publishing. I think this reflects the city’s mindset, and the new festival, Translated By, Bristol, launching in 2025, will be a great expression of this. I worked in Dublin for eight years, and the cultural sector in Ireland is generally quite well funded, and there’s definitely an appetite to welcome international writers and translators at festivals, which perhaps reflects their still being part of the EU and a sense of community with Europe.
I’ve been doing a deep dive into contemporary Swedish writing over the last six months, with many books having a big impact… it’s been a revelation!
You are currently working on a project with Swedish writers entitled ‘Stories From Sweden’. Are you able to tell us about what this project involves?
Stories From Sweden is a project bringing Swedish authors and their translators to the UK and Ireland for live events at festivals and other venues, in doing so raising the profile of Swedish literature here. The project is generously supported by the Swedish Arts Council in collaboration with the Swedish Embassy in the UK. The emphasis will be on the live event experience, both for the writers and translators and for audiences. But it will be much more than that, too, helping to strengthen relationships and networks, widening professional opportunities for writers and translators, and enabling them to meet new readers of their work. Stories From Sweden is based on the model developed for New Dutch Writing and Flip Through Flanders, and those two projects have had a profound effect in developing translators’ skills through workshops and mentorships and creating opportunities for writers via residencies and commissions. Stories From Sweden will help to build on the great work already being pursued by SELTA, Swedish Book Review and the independent publishers that are hungry to publish new translations.
Is there anything that you have learned about Swedish writing and culture over the course of this project that you didn’t know before? What has stood out most to you?
The project is in its initial stages, with the first events scheduled for May. But I’ve been doing a deep dive into contemporary Swedish writing over the last six months, with many books having a big impact… it’s been a revelation! I think it’s important to avoid sweeping statements about what defines a country’s literature or culture, but certain key themes have emerged. One of the first books I read was Marit Kapla’s book Osebol: Voices from a Swedish Village, which is made up of oral recordings reflecting the changing customs and character of a tiny rural community. Although it’s written in a completely different form and register and about an entirely different community, I couldn’t help thinking back to Osebol when I read Tangled Roots by Finland-Swedish writer Maria Turtschaninoff, a novel with an epic historical sweep, but that similarly focuses on a tiny rural hamlet and a handful of families whose roots stretch back over centuries. Intriguingly, Tangled Roots is set in Ostrobothnia in Finland, which is a region that, through my readings, I’ve become mildly obsessed with! It’s also the setting for one of my favourite Swedish-language novels – Quynh Tran’s Shade and Breeze, which reflects the experiences of the Vietnamese community in the same region in the present day. For someone like me, coming at the landscape of Swedish literature – both figuratively and literally – with fresh eyes, it seems wild that two such vastly different books could alight in the same, relatively unknown region, where Finland-Swedish is the dominant language. So on a very practical level, I’ve learnt about the different languages that ‘Swedish’ encompasses and how these map onto its shifting geographies over time. In one small geographical territory we get the very definition of 'rootedness' rubbing up alongside 21st century migration.
I want to develop more events about the creative process of translation – both the technical linguistic aspects, but also the wide research that a translator often undertakes to get inside the headspace of a poet or novelist.
Do you feel that festival planners’ and festivalgoers’ attitudes to literature in translation have changed over the past decade? If so, how?
When the International Booker Prize announced their shortlist in 2023, it was accompanied by much-discussed research that found that younger readers, aged 18-35, accounted for almost 50% of sales of translated fiction. This is exciting! Alongside this, post-Covid, we’ve seen a resurgence in independent bookshops, who often place a greater emphasis on international and translated literature. So I think literature in translation has a certain cache now that it didn’t have 10 years ago. To put it simply, it’s youthful, cool and defiant of the mainstream. As in so many areas of culture, shifts in habits and attitudes start on the margins and then become more central, and I think festivals are beginning to recognise the importance and brilliance of international authors and translators.
Cheltenham Literature Festival have run a very successful strand called ‘Read The World’ over the last five years; like many of the best curatorial ideas it has a clear message, and we’ve programmed some of our best events with international writers at the festival. Similarly, there is a big appetite for international writers in Ireland, and every year we do a range of events at festivals like International Literature Festival Dublin (May) and West Cork Literary Festival (July).
I think one of our biggest challenges for the future is to find more ways to feature translators on stage at festivals. I want to develop more events about the creative process of translation – both the technical linguistic aspects, but also the wide research that a translator often undertakes to get inside the headspace of a poet or novelist. I think it’s fair to say that most festivalgoers don’t really understand the hugely varied scope of what translation involves, and when they learn more, they find it fascinating!
What is the key to getting the public more engaged in translated works, do you think?
That is a broad question, and a very important one! I think many of the key strategies for public engagement are already in place, but there is a lot of work to do in amplifying them.
If by ‘public engagement’ you mean people reading the books, then I think the burgeoning indie bookshop scene and their support for translated literature has made a big impact: off the top of my head, I’m thinking of shops like Storysmith and bookhaus in Bristol, Voce Books in Birmingham, La Biblioteka in Sheffield and Burley Fisher in London, but of course there are numerous others! And alongside these shops’ support for the books, many of them have really lively events programmes, which help, I think, to build word of mouth, and create a club-like atmosphere.
Other than book sales and events, media coverage is of course very helpful, but it can be limited for translated books. The legacy media of newspaper and radio seems ever harder to obtain, but sometimes there are real breakthroughs. I’m currently working with the author Angelo Tijssens and his translator Michele Hutchison on their book The Edges (Daunt Books Originals) and the book has received noticeably diverse coverage – ranging from the Daily Mail to Monocle Radio to the TLS – which shows what can be achieved by a good campaign.
But what I said above – about the de-mystification of what translators do – I think remains key. These aren’t just stories written in English. It’s perhaps easy to forget that we ourselves are reading authors like Chekhov or Kafka in translation… and likewise, someone from Japan or Spain is doing the same with Sally Rooney or Margaret Atwood.
I still believe there’s no substitute for the live event - experiencing the atmosphere of a beautiful reading or the electricity of an insightful conversation.
What are the biggest changes that you have perceived in arts programming over the past decade, and what are the challenges and opportunities that these bring?
There are always challenges for the arts ecosystem, and facing up to the challenges can open up new vistas and generate fresh ideas.
I would say that the shift from in-person to online events during the pandemic was a big change, and it has had an impact on literature programming over the last five years. There are big positives to this, as it widens access, particularly if events are offered as a hybrid – e.g. they are both in-person and livestreamed… so a good example of new vistas.
I still believe there’s no substitute for the live event, however – experiencing the atmosphere of a beautiful reading or the electricity of an insightful conversation. What works well online are workshops; we’ve hosted a very successful series of translation workshops for Dutch translators since 2020.
But of course, the biggest challenge remains money, with, for example, the loss of Baillie Gifford funding for UK festivals and reductions in money available from government having a direct and discernible effect. It’s heartening though to be working on international projects such as Stories From Sweden – it broadcasts such a positive message.
What is next in the Modern Culture pipeline? What cultural highlights should we be looking out for in 2025?
Stories From Sweden is my major new project for this year, and I expect to be very busy with that. I’ll also be continuing to work on Flip Through Flanders and New Dutch Writing. There’s a superb range of work being translated across the three territories! Visit modernculture.co.uk for more details!
In terms of new projects, my major focus will be looking at writer and translator residencies, and to think about how these can enhance the work of the main projects, by commissioning new writing and bringing newly translated work into English. One focus here might be poetry, which tends to have a lower profile in translation than fiction and non-fiction. I’ve had some exciting conversations with residency spaces, such as Cove Park in Scotland.
The excitement for me always revolves around international writers visiting the UK and Ireland, meeting audiences, building networks and encountering other writers and translators from around the world. I can’t wait for Stories From Sweden to get started.
Modern Culture
Modern Culture is an agency set up by Martin Colthorpe to programme and commission events in international literature and across art forms. Modern Culture works in partnership with organisations to develop ideas and narratives for festivals and event series, featuring international writers and their translators.