Travelling, reading, and foreign languages are things we are passionate about. Today we delve into ten European countries and their most translated literature. Many of the most translated books in the world come from this continent. They are so well known that we have decided instead to focus on some other less known literature and their countries of origin. 

 

 

 

 

This dramatic poem published in 1861 is considered a masterpiece of the Hungarian playwright Imre Madách. It was translated into more than 90 languages.

Initially, it was published as a book, but the play never met the stage. The large number of changes required to represent 15 different scenes made it technically challenging for production.

The Tragedy of Man is about the creation and fall of men, and the devil is the protagonist. The main characters are Adam, Eve, and Lucifer. Its 15 scenes represent ten different moments in history.

It has become one of the leading literary works in Hungary's theater repertoire and a required reading for Hungarian high school students. Many of its quotes have become common expressions in Hungarian. 

 

 

Written originally in Dutch, The Diary of Anne Frank has been translated into more than 70 languages and is considered one of the critical documents from the Nazi era. It is also on the UNESCO world heritage list.

Anne Frank was born in Frankfurt, Germany, on June 12, 1929, to a Jewish family who fled to the Netherlands in 1934 to escape the Nazis. In 1940, the Nazis invaded the Netherlands, and in 1942, they intensified the Jewish persecution. This prompted her family to hide in a secret annex and other Jews for two years. The diary starts on June 12, 1942, when Anne Frank turned 13. “I hope I will be able to confide everything to you, as I have never been able to confide in anyone” was the first line written. The last entry dates August 1, 1944, three days before the Nazis found their hiding spot and seized Frank's family and the rest of the Jews.

The diary remained in Amsterdam with two employees of Otto Frank, Anne’s’ father, who would receive it after the war. Anne Frank died in March 1945. A few weeks later, the British liberated the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. 

Anne dreamed of being a writer and wanted to publish her diary under The Secret Annex. With time, her diary has turned into one of the most important testimonies of the Jews and other minorities’ persecution during Nazism.

 

 

3) Pippi Longstocking (Sweden) 

Pippi Longstocking is a literary character created by the Swedish writer Astrid Lindgren. 

Lindgren started Pippi’s story in the winter of 1941 when her seven-year-old daughter was ill and asked her to tell a story. The writer invented an imaginative story shared not only with her daughter but also with her friends. Two years later, Lindgren broke her leg and began writing the story, which she sent to a publisher but was turned down. 

In 1945, she decided to participate in a literary competition by the Rabén & Sjögren publishing company and won her first award. From then on, the book was a success and was translated into more than 70 languages. 

Ingrid Vang Nyman illustrated Pippi’s books. A television series was shot in 1969. And in the ’90s, a cartoon series was launched based on this character. 

 

Kon-Tiki was the name of the raft used by the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl in his 1947 expedition across the Pacific Ocean from Peru to Polynesia. Kon-Tiki is believed to be the ancient name of the Inca Sun God, Viracocha.

Kon-Tiki is also the book’s name that Heyerdahl wrote recounting the expedition’s adventures. The book became a bestseller and was translated into almost 70 languages. This story also became a movie and won an Oscar for best documentary in 1951.

 

The Kalevala is an epic compiled by Elias Lönnrot in the 19th century from Finnish folk stories, passed down from generation to generation, and through the compilations of folk tales made by rhapsodists.

A reminiscence and metaphysical conceptualization of the Finnish mythical generation, this medieval epic is one of the most suggestive and remarkable in Europe, which influenced the creation of The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien.

The Kalevala has been translated into 60 languages, and it is the best-known Finnish literary masterpiece in the world.

 

 

 

6) My Name is Red (Turkey) 

 

My Name is Red (Benim Adım Kırmızı in Turkish) is a 1998 Turkish novel written by the novelist Orhan Pamuk, who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2006. Based on the lives of various Ottoman illustrators, this book brought the international author fame. The works of Joyce, Kafka, Mann, Nabokov, and Proust have clearly influenced the writing of this book.

Pamuk’s literary work was translated into more than 60 languages. The original language version and its French translation received the Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger; the Italian version was awarded the Grinzane Cavour Prize in 2002. The English translation received the IMPAC International Dublin Literary Award in 2003. 

 

 

7) Quo Vadis? (Poland)

 

The novel of the Polish writer Henryk Sienkiewicz published in 1886, alludes to the Polish oppression through a story set in the Roman Empire. Quo Vadis? is characterized by the purest realism; describes a powerful historical setting, depicts characters, and captures the essence of suffering. This book was translated into 59 languages, and its author was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1905. 

 

8) The Good Soldier Švejk (Czechoslovakia)

The Good Soldier Švejk is an unfinished satire by Czech writer Jaroslav Hašek, published between 1921 and 1922, which tells the adventures of a Czech veteran soldier named Josef Švejk during World War One. 

Some of the character's experiences are based on actual events, either lived by Hašek or current news. In some instances, protagonists’ real names were intended to report them concealed.

The novel was planned for six volumes, but the author only completed four, given his sudden death in 1923 due to tuberculosis. It is the essential classic novel written in Czech, translated into 58 languages. 

This story has been subject to numerous adaptations in the media in central Europe: movies, a series, an opera, a musical, statues, and the inspiring décor for many European restaurants.

 

 

9) Heidi (Switzerland)

Heidi is a children's book by Swiss writer Johanna Spyri. The book is named after the main character of the story, a little girl who lives in the Swiss Alps near the border with Austria. 

Originally, Spyri published this literary work in two parts: Heidi: Her Years of Wandering and Learning, in 1880, and Heidi: How She Used What She Learned, in 1881. After 1885. The later editions unified both parts into one volume, and that is how the story is known worldwide, as the translations are based on the unified version of the novel. 

Heidi has made Spyri internationally famous, and it is one of the most-read books of Swiss literature in the world. The literary work has been translated into 50 languages, and there are numerous movies, comics, and cartoon adaptations. 

 

 

 

10) Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (Germany)

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer is the first novel of the German writer Patrick Süskind published in 1985 under the original name Das Parfum, die Geschichte eines Mörders. It quickly became a bestseller, and it is one of the most famous German classics, translated into 46 languages.

It is divided into four parts and fifty-one chapters; it transports the reader to an unfamiliar world, "the evanescent realm of smells,” through its protagonist, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille.