“The History of World Literature Must be Rewritten”: Shin Nihon bungaku and the Translation of Afro-Asian Literature

Christopher L. Hill
Professor of Comparative Literature and Modern Japanese Studies University of Michigan

Starting in the 1950s the Leftist literary hournal Shin Nihon bungaku (New Japanese Literature) introduced African and Asian literature to Japanese readers through translations, critical essays, and columns about literary life abroad. Internationalists in the journal’s ranks saw translation as an act of solidarity with peoples struggling for independence. Its collaborations with counterparts abroad formed channels of literary circulation that bypassed Western publishing, in a concrete realization of their political goals.

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Friday, 4 April 2025, 6:00PM EDT
Kent Hall, Room 403