Oct 18 2008
Translation Is Foreign to U.S. Publishers
This is true, unfortunately.
Anne-Solange Noble, the foreign-rights director at Gallimard in France, said American publishers did not support translated books with marketing budgets and then complained when sales failed to dazzle, and was amused — but also appeared irritated — when she recounted running into an American publisher who, on the first night of the fair, described Mr. Le Clézio as “an unknown writer.”
An American publisher said that he had purchased the rights to a foreign book for as little as $2,000. .. why not more translated books then??