This page is dedicated to helping readers discover recommendations and resources to help them along in their journey to reading more world literature. Read about the “why” on this journey, or just jump ahead to the resources below.
Why Read Around the World?
Here at A Well-Read Wanderer, we’re a community of adventurous readers, the kind who want to:
In today’s world, the internet brings us news from every corner of the globe (almost always negative), and social media floods our feeds with aspirational travel images in between internet arguments.
In our hyper-connected world, it’s getting harder and harder to have an actual, genuine connection to other places and cultures.
But reading! Reading remains a genuine, accessible, and often overlooked avenue to travel your way around the world in meaningful and memorable ways. Reading the literature of other countries gives you a peek into other cultures, perspectives, and traditions. When we read books written by writers from other countries, we get to exist inside the minds of people who live there, and we walk a mile — or at least a few hundred pages — in their shoes.
To Read Around the World means to deeply experience the world around you, to read with intention, and to receive more of the world’s wisdom with an open curiosity.
Plus, you’ll just get to discover some damn good books along the way. Books you may never have encountered otherwise, because they’re typically not found on BookTok or any bestseller list.
Explore literature from:
195
countries
37
world territories
3k+
languages
Read Around the World: Resources to Help You in Your Quest
Whether you’re working on a formal Read Around the World Challenge or just want to intentionally read more world literature without any set goal, we are here to help! I’m always compiling resources to help us both find more books to read, especially from countries that are smaller and less often translated into other languages.
This is a living, breathing resource, so bookmark this page so you can keep coming back as it’s updated.
Read Around the World Journal
$13.99 paperback | $19.99 hardcover
Track your progress on a Read Around the World journey with my custom-designed reading tracker, available on Amazon.
Where to find books from around the world?
One of the biggest challenges for a Read Around the World goal can be finding books from each of the countries and regions of the world. In the US, only about 3% of all books published are works in translation. As we all start to seek out and read more books in translation, hopefully we can collectively help move the needle and show publishers there is demand for international literature.
To find recommendations, I suggest checking out the following:
- My recommended book lists (I’m always adding new locations):
- My monthly newsletter: in this free newsletter, I share recommended reads much sooner than I do on the blog (compiling lists by country takes me months of reading, but I like to share standout books as I read them with my subscribers)
- Join the brand new Read the World Community Facebook group, where readers from around the globe share world literature, music, and film recommendations
Here are some more resources I recommend for finding books from other countries:
- Publisher’s Weekly Translation Database: search by language or by country
- International Booker Prize nominations: awarded annually for the finest single work of fiction from around the world which has been translated into English and published in the UK and/or Ireland. Check out the long list each year for the nominees.
- World Literature Today: an every-other-monthly magazine featuring reviews of international literature (paid subscription, but a 30-day free digital trial is available. Digital subscription is only $3/month)
- Three Percent: Part of the University of Rochester’s translation program and Open Letter, the university’s translation press, Three Percent is a place for students to present their translations and reviews, as well as a place to cultivate the next generation of literary enthusiasts.
- Cultural Reads: Your platform for books, music, and movies from countries around the world
- TripFiction: TripFiction was created to make it easy to find that perfect combination of book and destination, and from our database you can easily search by location, title, author and genre.
- A Year of Reading the World: An author’s year-long journey through a book from every country in the world, posting about the books as she goes
- African Literature Association: Check their “Book of the Year” Awards and nominations for ideas for literature from African countries
- 16 Writers on Their Favorite Translated Titles from Across Asia, compiled by the Transpacific Literary Project
- Recommended books from Oceania and the Pacific Islands by da Shop, one of my favorite Honolulu bookstores
- Oceania books compiled by the Pima County Public Library as part of their “Read Harder” challenge
Some common questions when Reading Around the World
Once you begin a journey to Read Around the World, you quickly start to realize that such a simple sounding goal can actually raise some very complex questions. We like this. Asking questions, re-examining the way you look at the world and the things you take for granted, sitting with discomfort, these are all GOOD things.
As you begin a Read Around the World journey, you might start to question:
- How many countries are there? How do we define a country? And whose judgment should I rely on to determine that?
- Should I read books written by authors from that country? Or am I okay with books that are set there but written by outsiders? How does that change my experience of a place through books?
- Should I prioritize reading books by authors from that country, no matter where the book is set?
- Why aren’t there more languages and literature available in translation?
These and many more questions will arise on your journey to Read Around the World, and while the questions are important, there are no easy answers. But here are some resources you can refer to as these questions come up for you:
On how we define countries:
- United Nations criteria for recognizing countries
- WorldData.info on how countries can be defined
- “How we classify countries and people—and why it matters,” a journal article breaking down how colonial language influences how we look at and subconsciously “rank” different countries of the world
On the complexities that arise with a Reading Around the World journey:
- A podcast interview with Ann Morgan on Zero to Travel is a great listen
- On the tendency to treat Africa as a country rather than a continent when teaching its literature, and the disproportionate representation of a few African countries’ literature; a very illuminating read with some great data
On the availability of books in translation:
- On the Japanese – English translation gap
- On why there are still so few English translations available
- On the under-recognized and sometimes invisible work of translators
- A look at the availability of books in translation by gender
Again, this resources page is a living, breathing document. Have a great resource you think I should add to this page? Please email me!
