"We keep on wanting to look out to sea, because the sea is as unforgettable as it is unmemorable."

"If you speak Spanish or French or Italian or German, or any of a dozen other languages," says John Carey in today's Guardian, "and walk into your local bookstore, you will ... find what is being imagined in China, what stories are being told in Korea, how the novel is being reinvented in Spain and the Scandinavian countries. But if you live in England you will find no such abundance." This is sadly true, and undermining the narrow-mindedness of conventional publishers and booksellers is partly what the Internet's for. I've mentioned them before, but I'd recommend a look around Babelguides and World Literature Today if you feel you're not getting enough foreign lit.