Chinese-Greek Collaborative Ventures around Children's Books

This article describes recent Chinese-Greek collaborative ventures around children's books, presenting them as an example of the prospects and opportunities emerging for creative and diverse synergies between children's book publishers that break away from dominating English-language book markets. The article is informed by my participation in the 36th IBBY International Congress in Athens, my visit to Zhejiang Juvenile and Children's Publishing House facilities in China, and my on-site research around the Chinese book publishing industry.

Today, relations between China and Greece are constantly becoming tighter with the increasing emergence of new cultural, educational, and business collaborations between state institutions and private companies. A memorandum of cooperation for a "Project for translation and publication of classical and modern literary works of China and Greece" was signed in April 2017. A cooperative publishing model had emerged some years earlier, in 2008. Anthologies of Greek poetry, children's books, short stories, and theater plays were translated into Chinese and published in China on the occasion of Greece's participation as an honored country at the 2008 International Book Fair in Beijing. Two years later, in Thessaloniki, Greece, this model continued, as it was the turn of Chinese books to be translated in Greek, on the occasion of China's participation as an honored country at the Seventh International Book Fair in Thessaloniki.

In 2010 a new model of publishing efforts was launched in Beijing through the Sino-Greek Cultural Exchange Project, which focused on children literature at the beginning stage. According to the agreement, two children's books would be published, the first one written by a famous Greek author (Eugenios Trivizas) and illustrated by a Chinese illustrator, and the other written by a famous Chinese author (Qin Wenjun) in collaboration with a Greek illustrator (the agreement has not yet been implemented). In 2011 state and private organizations from Greece and China (Aikaterini Laskaridis Foundation, Greek and Chinese IBBY, and Zhejiang Juvenile and Children's Publishing House, among others) collaborated to put together an exhibition of contemporary children's book illustrations in Athens. Sixty projects by eighteen well-known Chinese illustrators, as well as two hundred contemporary Chinese illustrated children's books, were exhibited.

Since 2010 Chinese and Greek children's book publishing industries are becoming more active in the field of buying and selling rights. The most important collaborations are listed below in chronological order:

• • 2010: The Three Little Wolves by Eugenios Trivizas. This is published in China by The People's Literature Publishing House; Minoas is the Greek publisher.

• • 2013: The Little Triangle-Fish series (seven books) by Vangelis Iliopoulos. This is published in China by Tianjin Maitian Culture Communication Co. Ltd.; Patakis is the Greek publisher.

• • 2017: Become a Planet Agent and The Revenge of Pee-ew by Eleni Andreathaki (the Planet Agents series). The Chinese publishing house CITIC Kids ensured the translation rights of the two books, which are published in the Greek market by Metaichnio publications.

• • 2018: Ash Dresses Her Friends by Fu Wenzheng. The Greek publishing house Oasis has established the translation rights of the book, which is published in China by ZJJ&C.

The preferred themes in the examples listed above include ecological issues, friendship, culture and language, and myths.

Many important steps have been taken, but more can be done. Continuing challenges are the lack of knowledge of each other's markets; the lack of long-term planning, continuity, and consistency; and the lack of translators who can translate directly from one language to the other. It is important to note, however, that in spite of their differences, the two book markets do share some common characteristics, such as the highlighting of their celebrated cultural heritages—in terms of their rich mythology, history, and tradition—combined with efforts to renarrate their traditional stories for new generations of readers, focusing on universal themes.