National Book Week gift rewritten due to Turkish sensitivities

The National Book Week Gift (Boekenweekgeschenk) will be rewritten for Turkish readers. “Mistakes” unintentionally crept into the text, the Collective Propaganda for the Dutch Book Foundation (CPNB) stated Friday.

Each year, an author writes a story or novella that the Dutch get for free when purchasing a book in the Dutch language during the Book Week. This year, the Book Week Gift was a travel story by Geert Mak entitled De Brug (The Bridge), in which residents of Istanbul speak about their city’s history. For the first time the Book Week Gift also appeared in a second language: Turkish.

De Brug appeared in a record-breaking edition of 910,000 copies during the Book Week in March. Among this number were 20,000 copies in Turkish. CPNB, which organises the Book Week, wished to “cater to Turkish Dutch people who prefer to read literature in their mother language”. But the Turkish translation “contains mistakes and an improved version is being reprinted”, a spokesperson Friday stated.

According to CPNB, there were two versions of the Turkish translation. One was the literal translation and the other was the version that took into account “sensitivities”. In the definitive translation however, the “different text files got mixed up”, resulting in “errors”, about which the CPNB wished to remain mysterious.

The “correct” version of De Brug is now to appear after all. CPNB expects the book to be available around April 20. Owners of the Turkish translation can exchange their current copy for the altered version free of charge.

Geert Mak is a staunch advocate of Turkish accession to the EU. The Turkish edition was partially funded by the Foreign Ministry.

Source: NIS News, 7 April 2007