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THE INSIDE STORY Cover art for the Volta project: 'Last Light' by Jean Macalpine (above); and (right) Peter and the InterLitQ Vice-Presidents 22 The Linguist Vol/56 No/2 2017 www.ciol.org.uk FEATURES InterLitQ Founder Peter Robertson on his rollercoaster decade with the multilingual international review I n September 2017, InterLitQ (the online multilingual International Literary Quarterly) will be ten years old. It has been a chequered decade, with innumerable highs and lows, but it is likely that we will continue far beyond our 10th anniversary to face – and hopefully rise to – many new challenges. The origin of InterLitQ dates back to my days as a correspondent for the New York- based publication Mad Hatters' Review, founded by the indomitable Carol Novack, the author and erstwhile lawyer, who passed away far too young, at just 63. I was living in Madrid at the time, and I had come across some texts by the Spanish author Juan José Millás, which I set about translating. It was one of my early forays into literary translation, and I was at a loss as to where to send them. My first choice was Carol, who not only accepted the work, but also suggested that I assume the role of UK Editor for her review. Flattered by her invitation, I accepted gladly. Returning to live in London, I began preparing a feature that would profile music, art and literature by contemporary Scottish artists such as Calum Colvin, Janice Galloway and Tom Pow. It appeared in Mad Hatters' Review (MHR) in February 2007, followed by a feature on the work of English artists, including George Blacklock, Aamer Hussein and Gabriel Josipovici, in the June issue. Carol's mantra seemed to be that work in her review should be avant-garde. I saw this as a limitation, believing instead that merit transcends alignment with a particular literary tendency. With this touchstone in mind, I started to conceive of launching my own literary review, which would fight shy of any artistic allegiance. I tendered my resignation to Carol and launched The International Literary Quarterly that September. Despite our ideological differences, Carol and I remained on good terms, with an example of her work appearing in issue 1 of InterLitQ. Without all that I had learnt during my time with MHR, and especially the rudimentary technological knowledge I acquired, I very much doubt that InterLitQ would have come into being at all, and so the seed that Carol planted lives on to this day – not only in her own review but also in mine. Inclusiveness and diversity The leitmotiv for InterLitQ was inclusiveness, and the review has set out to publish literature in many languages, and in several genres. Indeed, the apotheosis of this overarching idea took place thanks to the intervention of the literary translator Sophie Lewis. She had been approached by Richard Burns (aka Richard Berengarten), the poet and Cambridge academic, who was keen to publish the Volta project: an anthology of poems. A poem by Richard, inspired by George Seferis, and 92 translations, Volta was, in Richard's words, "a celebration of multilingualism and diversity" in 93 contemporary languages. Regarding this proposal as unique and fascinating, I seized the opportunity, and so InterLitQ came to publish literature in languages such as Abkhaz, Mongolian, Nupe and Samburu. After a long hiatus, we will now resume publication of Volta, with the inclusion of texts in additional languages, including Piedmontese and Sardinian. In The adventures of a literary review