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Tears on the Sword, at last

I have another translated short story to announce!

Six months ago my translation of ‘Les Larmes sur l’épée’ by Catulle Mendès – ‘Tears on the Sword’ – was accepted by the Agorist Writers Workshop for the anthology FairyTale Riot. At last! It’s available as an ebook or print copy here: Amazon.

The Agorist Writers Workshop is a small group of liberty-minded individuals with an interest in creative writing. (I’m not sure what ‘liberty-minded’ means but I’m definitely interested in creative writing!) This is their 4th anthology. Fortunately for me they were looking for fairy tales, fables and folklore, and I happen to have a stash of them in my metaphorical bottom drawer. It was a big thrill to find an anthology seeking my kind of story and a bigger thrill to be accepted. They even found an illustration appropriate to the story and put it on Facebook: Roland, the protagonist, a fabled heroic figure of French history, is blowing his horn to call for help when almost all of his men are dead.

While Roland in ‘Tears on the Sword’ doesn’t blow his horn, the image on Facebook is nevertheless of Roland and his dead soldiers. It’ll do.

Roland’s story is composed of a little truth and much invention. His sword, Durandal, was so strong that when Roland worried that some other soldier would take it after his death, he cried over it and tried to break it on a solid porch step, but the sword broke the step! Durandal remained undamaged.

But in Mendès’ tale, Roland cries over the sword for a different reason. Read it in FairyTale Riot and discover why he cried and what the connection is with liberty-seekers.

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Tears on the Sword

The Agorist Writers Workshop has just announced the titles of stories for their new anthology, Fairytale Riot. I’m very fortunate to have one of my translations included, “Tears on the Sword”, originally “Les Larmes sur l’épée” by Catulle Mendès. The theme for this, their 4th anthology, is libertarian retellings of classic folklore, fables, and fairy tales. Mendès, who reworked a large number of fairy tales during the Belle Époque, fits the bill.

This morning I discovered memes on their Facebook page for each of the 28 stories, teasing little images that give you a taste for each one. They’ve chosen fairy tale illustrations that seem appropriate to each title. Here’s the meme for mine:

Release of the printed anthology and ebook will be in July 2018. I’m so pleased knowing someone wants to publish my work! There’s such a lot of effort goes into a translation and then finding an editor who wants to show it to the world. It’s a good day today!

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