Fitzcarraldo Editions adds titles by Janet Frame and Edward Said to its classics list

Fitzcarraldo Editions has snapped up two novels by Janet Frame and two works of non-fiction by Edward Said for its classics list, with Frame’s The Edge of the Alphabet (George Braziller) and Said’s The Question of Palestine (Vintage) to appear in the autumn.

Publisher Jacques Testard acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, to Said’s The Question of Palestine and Representations of the Intellectual (Vintage) from Tracy Bohan at the Wylie Agency, on behalf of the Said Estate. The Question of Palestine, which traces the "fatal collision between two peoples in the Middle East", will be published in October, while Representations of the Intellectual, a collection of essays on "the role of the intellectual in public life", based on the 1993 Reith Lectures, will follow in 2026.

"I have long admired Edward Said’s work and am very excited at the prospect of publishing his work, as are all of my colleagues," Testard said. "The Question of Palestine was a trailblazing book when it appeared in 1979 and it is astonishing how relevant and contemporary it still feels 44 years later."

Moreover, Fitzcarraldo Editions’ associate publisher Tamara Sampey-Jawad bought UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, to The Edge of the Alphabet by the celebrated New Zealand author Frame from Jennifer Bernstein at the Wylie Agency, on behalf of the Frame Estate, in a two-book deal.

The author’s third novel, written when she lived in London, will be published on 28th August, the centenary of her birth, and will feature a foreword by Catherine Lacey. The synopsis says: "Toby Withers, a young man with epilepsy, leaves New Zealand after the death of his mother. While on-board a ship to England, he meets Zoe, a middle-aged woman looking for a life of meaning, and Pat, an Irishman who claims to have many friends but treats people with carelessness. Alike in their alienation, all three embark on a new life in London, piecing together an existence in the margins of the urban world."

Sampey-Jawad commented: "A masterpiece of 20th-century literature, The Edge of the Alphabet is a poignant, thought-provoking and exhilarating meditation on borderlands, of the self, of the real and of language. Janet Frame was a visionary writer without parallel, and I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to publish her in our classics series."

Fitzcarraldo Editions launched a classics list in 2023, with Macunaíma by Mário de Andrade, translated by Katrina Dodson, as well as A Very Easy Death by Simone de Beauvoir, translated by Patrick O’Brian, and The Possessed by Witold Gombrowicz, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones. Elias Canetti’s The Book Against Death, translated by Peter Filkins, and John A Williams’ The Man Who Cried I Am, will follow in the spring.