NUMBER ONE BESTSELLING AUTHOR JO NESBO TO RETELLMACBETH
FOR THE HOGARTH SHAKESPEARE
The Hogarth Shakespeare, a major international publishing initiative across the Penguin Random House Group, has commissioned Jo Nesbo – number one bestselling author of the Harry Hole thrillers – to retell Macbeth, one of Shakespeare’s darkest and most powerful tragedies.
Jo Nesbo’s books have sold over 20 million copies worldwide and are published in over 40 countries. Nesbo’s latest novelPolice is the nail-biting follow-up to his number one bestseller Phantom and is the tenth in the Harry Hole series.The Snowman, the fifth Harry Hole thriller, has recently been optioned by Working Title films. The 2011 film adaptation of Nesbo’s stand-alone thrillerHeadhunters was nominated for a BAFTA. A new stand-alone thriller The Son will be published in April by Harvill Secker.
Nesbo says: ‘Macbeth is a story that is close to my heart because it tackles topics I’ve been dealing with since I started writing. A main character who has the moral code and the corrupted mind, the personal strength and the emotional weakness, the ambition and the doubts to go either way. A thriller about the struggle for power, set both in a gloomy, stormy crime noir-like setting and in a dark, paranoid human mind. No, it does not feel too far from home. And, yes, it is a great story. And, no, I will not attempt to do justice to William Shakespeare nor the story. I will simply take what I find of use and write my own story. And, yes, I will have the nerve to call it Macbeth.’
Becky Hardie, Deputy Publishing Director, Chatto & Windus/Hogarth, acquired world rights in all languages from Niclas Salomonsson at the Salomonsson Agency, Sweden. Hardie says: ‘From the very start we wanted The Hogarth Shakespeare to surprise and excite readers of all kinds from all over the world. Having an international thriller writer of Jo Nesbo’s stature and popularity on board is the perfect realisation of that wish. We can’t wait to see what Jo does with Shakespeare’s murderous play.’
Nesbo joins an illustrious line-up of novelists on the new Hogarth Shakespeare list, which sees contemporary authors retelling Shakespeare’s plays for a twenty-first century audience; Margaret Atwood has chosen The Tempest, Howard Jacobson The Merchant of Venice, Anne Tyler The Taming of the Shrew and Jeanette Winterson The Winter’s Tale.
The series will launch in 2016 to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. This international publishing initiative is led by Hogarth UK and published in partnership with Hogarth US, Knopf Canada, Knaus Verlag in Germany and Lumen in Spain; and Random House Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and India. The novels will be published simultaneously across the English-speaking world in print, digital and audio formats.
Please direct all translation rights queries to Monique Corless, Foreign Rights Manager, Vintage Publishing:mcorless@randomhouse.co.uk.
UK Contact: Lisa Gooding
+44 20 7840 8677
US Contact: Annsley Rosner
+1 212 782 9740
Note to Editors:
About Hogarth
In 1917 Virginia and Leonard Woolf started The Hogarth Press from their Richmond home, Hogarth House, armed only with a hand-press and a determination to publish the newest, most inspiring writing. It went on to publish some of the twentieth century’s most significant writers, joining forces with Chatto & Windus in 1946.
Inspired by their example, Hogarth was launched in 2012 as a home for a new generation of literary talent; an adventurous fiction imprint with an accent on the pleasures of storytelling and a keen awareness of the world. Hogarth is a partnership between Chatto & Windus in the UK and Crown in the US, and its novels are published from London and New York.
Hogarth has enjoyed notable international success with Shani Boianjiu’s debut novel,The People of Forever Are Not Afraid, which was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction in the UK, and theNew York Times bestseller A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra, winner of the 2012 Whiting Award. In the US, Hogarth has also had significant success with theNew York Times bestseller The Dinner by Herman Koch.
About The Hogarth Shakespeare
The Hogarth Shakespeareprogramme will launch in 2016, coinciding with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. This international publishing initiative is led by Hogarth UK and published in partnership with Hogarth US, Knopf Canada, Knaus Verlag in Germany and Lumen in Spain; and Random House Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and India. The novels will be published simultaneously across the English-speaking world in print, digital and audio formats.
The concept of The Hogarth Shakespeare was devised by Juliet Brooke, Senior Editor at Chatto & Windus/Hogarth and Becky Hardie, Deputy Publishing Director. With Clara Farmer, Publishing Director, they comprise the UK publishing team.
The US publishing team are Molly Stern, Senior Vice President, Publisher, Crown, Hogarth, and Broadway Books; and Alexis Washam, Senior Editor, Hogarth. The series will be published in Canada by Louise Dennys, Executive Publisher, Random House of Canada Limited; in Germany by Claudia Vidoni of Knaus Verlag; and in Spain by Silvia Querini of Lumen.
All translation rights queries should be directed to Monique Corless, Foreign Rights Manager, Vintage Publishing:mcorless@randomhouse.co.uk
About Penguin Random House
Penguin Random House (http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/) is the world’s first truly global trade book publisher. It was formed on 1 July, 2013, upon the completion of an agreement between Bertelsmann and Pearson to merge their respective trade publishing companies, Random House and Penguin, with the parent companies owning 53% and 47%, respectively. Penguin Random House comprises the adult and children’s fiction and non-fiction print and digital trade book publishing businesses of Penguin and Random House in the US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India, Penguin’s trade publishing activity in Asia and South Africa; Dorling Kindersley worldwide; and Random House’s companies in Spain, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, and Chile. Penguin Random House employs more than 10,000 people globally across almost 250 editorially and creatively independent imprints and publishing houses that collectively publish more than 15,000 new titles annually. Its publishing lists include more than 70 Nobel Prize laureates and hundreds of the world’s most widely read authors.
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