Valerie Miles

Valerie Miles
Born1963
New York
OccupationEditor
LanguageEnglish and Spanish
NationalityAmerican

Valerie Miles (New York, 1963) is a publisher, writer, translator and the co–founder of Granta en español. She is known for promoting Spanish and Latin American literature and their translation in the English speaking world, at the same time as bringing American and British authors to Spain and Latin America for the first time, working with main publishing houses on the sector. She is currently the co-director of Granta en español and The New York Review of Books in its Spanish translation. On 2012 she co-curated a Roberto Bolaño exhibit[1] at the Center for Contemporary Culture in Barcelona.[2] In addition, she is a professor in the post-graduate program for literary translation at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona.[3]

Biography[edit]

Born in New York, she grew up in Pennsylvania; before moving to Spain in 1990, where she began writing about British and American literature in La Vanguardia newspaper in 1994. Since then, Miles has published articles, interviews and reviews, also on Spanish language literature for ABC, La Nación, Reforma and El País.

Publishing[edit]

In 1999, she started working as a publishing editor for Debolsillo, part of Random House Spain. In May 2001 she became publishing director at Emecé Editores (Planeta),[4] where she published or promoted translations to Spanish of writers like John Cheever, Richard Yates, Yasunari Kawabata, Silvina Ocampo, Edgardo Cozarinsky, Lydia Davis, Monica Ali and Eliot Weinberger, among others. On 2006 she moved to Alfaguara,[5] where she published John Banville, Joyce Carol Oates, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, James Lasdun and Gary Shteyngart. Between 2008 and 2012, she was named publishing director of Duomo Ediciones, an imprint of the Italian group Mauri Spagnol, where she published both the work of young Spanish-language authors such as Carlos Yushimito, Sebastià Jovani and Rodrigo Hasbún and the work of English-language writers in Spain and Latin America, such as David Mitchell, Azar Nafisi, Nicholson Baker, Aleksandar Hemon, Jayne Anne Phillips, John Gray and William Boyd. She also published co-editions Spanish translations of books from the New York Review of Books collection of contemporary classics.[6] In 2013, she was voted one of the "Most Influential Professionals in Publishing" by the Buenos Aires Book Fair.[7]

Granta[edit]

Valerie Miles founded Granta en español in 2003 together with Aurelio Major.[8] Project has been sponsored by Emecé, Alfaguara, Duomo and now by Galaxia Gutenberg in Barcelona, Spain.[9] The magazine has published nineteen issues so far, including the highly acclaimed selection of The Best of Young Spanish-language Novelists,[10][11] In April 2014, it was announced that the publisher Galaxia Gutenberg would undertake the publications of the magazine.[12]

Publications[edit]

As a writer In 2014 she published A Thousand Forests in One Acorn, an anthology for which 28 writer Spanish-language writers chose a selection of their own work as representative, with comments by the authors and discussion of their influences.[13] Participants include Mario Vargas Llosa, Javier Marías, Juan Goytisolo, Ana María Matute and Carlos Fuentes.[14] Book was later translated to Romanian.[15][16]

As a journalist, she has written articles and book reviews for The New York Times,[17] The Paris Review, Harper´s, Granta, La Vanguardia, La Nación and the cultural supplement, ABCD.[18]

As a translator, she has translated into English the work of authors such as Enrique Vila-Matas,[19] Edmundo Paz Soldán, Lucía Puenzo and Fernando Aramburu for publishing houses such as New Directions and Granta.[20]

Bibliography[edit]

  • A Thousand Forests in One Acorn (Rochester: Open Letter, 2014; ISBN 978-1-934824-91-7); Spanish edition, Mil bosques en una bellota, Duomo, Barcelona, 2012 ISBN 9788492723928

References[edit]

  1. ^ Brock, Ollie. "Reviewed: Archivo Bolaño", New Statesman, London, 27 March 2013.
  2. ^ "Bolaño Archive. 1977- 2003 | Exhibitions | CCCB". CCCB. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
  3. ^ "Valerie Miles | Contributors | Granta Magazine". Granta.com. Retrieved 2014-05-29.
  4. ^ Digital, La Vanguardia (May 30, 2001). "Valerie Miles, directora general de Emecé en España". hemeroteca.lavanguardia.com (in Spanish). Retrieved 2017-05-12.
  5. ^ "50 años de Alfaguara". Alfaguara. 2008. Archived from the original on 2014-12-30.
  6. ^ "Valérie Miles | - Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona". Cccb.org. Retrieved 2014-05-29.
  7. ^ "Los profesionales más influyentes | 30.as Jornadas de Profesionales del Libro | Sitio Oficial" (in Spanish). El-libro.org.ar. 1984-01-11. Archived from the original on 2014-07-08. Retrieved 2014-05-29.
  8. ^ HighBeam
  9. ^ "Granta". www.granta.com.es. Archived from the original on 2016-04-02. Retrieved 2017-05-12.
  10. ^ Flood, Alison. "Granta Names Best Young Spanish Novelists", The Guardian, London, 1 October 2010.
  11. ^ Manrique, Winston. "Una autobiografía y un manifiesto inéditos de Roberto Bolaño",El País, Barcelona, 3 October 2012.
  12. ^ "Granta inicia su cuarta aventura apostando por la crónica",El País, Barcelona, 5 April 2014.
  13. ^ Kan, Elianna (9 April 2015). "The Forest of Letters: An Interview with Valerie Miles". The Paris Review. Retrieved 16 April 2015.
  14. ^ Chiaravalli, Verónica. "Razones de autor que el lector desconoce", La Nación, Buenos Aires, 15 February 2013
  15. ^ Cervantes, Instituto. "La literatura como necesidad: Valerie Miles y José María Merino en diálogo". bucarest.cervantes.es. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
  16. ^ "Valerie Miles și José María Merino vin în România - Agentia de carte". www.agentiadecarte.ro. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
  17. ^ Miles, Valerie (2015-08-12). "Review: Enrique Vila-Matas Plots His Own Awakening in 'The Illogic of Kassel'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
  18. ^ "Duomo Ediciones". Duomo Ediciones. Retrieved 2014-05-29.
  19. ^ "New Directions Publishing Company - Two Voices Salon with Valerie Miles on Enrique Vila-Matas". New Directions Publishing Company. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
  20. ^ "Valerie Miles". Words Without Borders. Retrieved 2014-05-29.

External links[edit]