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From: davidl@orca.UUCP (David Levine)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Worldcon Comments
Message-ID: <59@orca.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 12-Aug-83 14:01:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: orca.59
Posted: Fri Aug 12 14:01:58 1983
Date-Received: Sat, 13-Aug-83 17:57:26 EDT
References: sri-arpa.4031
Lines: 19

This article seems to be the beginning of what could become a long discussion
on the nature of non-English SF.  My French drill instructor for one semester
was a great SF reader and somewhat fannish, and he told me that there was very
little SF written in French, and what there was wasn't very good.  Most SF
published in France is translated from the English.  About a year ago I acquired
a copy of Damon Knight's book of translations of French SF (the title eludes me
at the moment, but was something descriptive like "French Science Fiction
Stories") and was not particularly thrilled by the overall quality.  I had read
one of these stories in the French, so I have reason to believe that it was the
stories themselves, and not the translation, which was at fault.

Comments I have read and heard from other multiligual fen lead me to believe
that there is very little SF in non-English-speaking countries, and therefore
very little fan activity.  This may stem from the US's history of science and
technology.  (The question this raises is: what is the current state of SF in
Japan?)

  -- David D. Levine   (...decvax!tektronix!tekecs!davidl)      [UUCP]
                       (...tekecs!davidl.tektronix@rand-relay)  [ARPA]