EARTH OBSERVATION REPORT · No. 012

FROM: Listener 1379 ｜ TO: Fleet Command

SUBJECT: Earth — a book launch at the Frankfurt fair ｜ DATE: October 2026, Earth calendar

I. OBSERVATION

On the morning of 8 October 2026, at the Frankfurt Book Fair, a publishing house held an event titled "Drawing the Liu Cixin Universe: from the *Three-Body* graphic novel to *The Firekeeper*." There they formally released the German edition of the *Three-Body* graphic novel. Two people unveiled it: Kai-Steffen Schwarz, editorial director for comics, graphic novels and webcomics at Carlsen Verlag in Germany, and Ge Lin of Yilin Press.

Source: the on-site report by Qian Huanqing, Feng Video (ifeng), 14 October 2026.

Schwarz explained why he chose to publish it:

> "Our department has long brought European and American comics to China and has published a great many well-known science-fiction comics; fantasy and science fiction are among our most popular categories. To have the graphic-novel adaptation of Liu Cixin's outstanding science-fiction trilogy is a great honour for us. We have brought in relatively few works by Chinese authors; this one is a very important new project for us. The book market is fiercely competitive and the publishing risk is very high — we only green-light a title when we sincerely believe in it."

Sharing the stage was Xia Haiming, a Spanish sinologist and translator — translator of the Spanish edition of the novel and of volume one of the graphic novel. The hardest part, he said:

> "The biggest challenge is balancing the original text against the physical limits of the graphic-novel format. The limited space in a speech bubble does not allow long, refined sentences; the translator has to compress and simplify the original while preserving its spirit."

The event also promoted *The Firekeeper*, Liu Cixin's only science-fiction fairy tale, introduced on stage as "a boy who wants nothing but to polish the stars, and who lights the sun." The book exists in Chinese, Japanese and Korean; in August 2026 Yilin Press brought out a new collector's edition, and in September an immersive space for it opened at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum.

The verifiable rights list so far: the *Three-Body* graphic novel has been licensed in German, French, Turkish, Italian, Greek and Russian; *The Firekeeper* in Russian and Hungarian, with more languages under negotiation.

Asked what makes a story travel, Schwarz said:

> "What moves readers the world over is always the grand core idea behind the story. An adaptation cannot copy the original word for word; the important thing is to keep its inner spirit, its core conception and its characters."

II. REPORT

HQ records the following: they are putting this volume into frames and hanging it on a stand.

First a book, then a graphic novel, then a picture book, then an immersive room in a museum in Shanghai, then a slogan about lighting the sun. The path is plain to us — a civilisation moving its most important text from one medium to another, and from one language to another. The lighter the handling, the heavier the thing being handled.

Their translator put it most precisely: a small bubble cannot hold a long sentence, so they compress, they simplify, and then they try to keep hold of the thing itself. They call the thing they keep its "spirit."

Their publisher put it better still. The market is crowded, the risk high; they will only green-light a book they sincerely believe in. HQ has been considering that sentence for a while.

The book they sincerely believe in is the account of our arrival.

III. ASSESSMENT

They gave this volume a new cover at a book fair, rendered it in six languages, and introduced it to readers on another continent.

They thought it was hope.

It has been filed away — the earliest edition of this volume was printed twenty years ago.

And the fleet is already under way.

They drew it into pictures, compressed it into speech bubbles, and set it on a stand.

And on their shelves, it goes under "fiction."

I reserve my view on whether to tighten the information blockade on this planet.

> — Listener 1379