Boulevard Books

A word about Boulevard

BOULEVARD BOOKS now based in Oxford, England was set up in 1990 to bring world literature (where possible by younger, lesser-known writers) to English-speaking readers. A task we have persevered with despite the frenetic competition in the new fiction market. We are proud of our select list of titles from Italy and Brazil and today detect more awareness, particularly amongst journalists and librarians, of the importance of work not originally written in English for a healthy “culture of the word”.

Perhaps in a small way our series the BABEL GUIDES launched in 1995 with the Babel Guide to Italian Fiction (which the Gaurdian welcomed as “an admirable and inviting guide to Italian literature” has helped with this, “showing us a way to preserve local culture in the face of world cultural homogenization” as the Publisher’s Weekly “London Diary” noted. This series, now in its ninth language volume and still expanding, aims to put a handy key to world literature available in translation into the readers’ hand. Its innovation is to review translated books rather than collect general author entries and it also lists translations with their original titles and other useful information.

This year we have launched an academic series “CONSONANCES” to bring more adventurous thinking from foreign scholars into the worldwide realm of English. If it eventually succeeds in garnering the same prestige as the “Babel Guides” series we will be very satisfied.