Susan Bernofsky's Blog, page 34

Translate at Bread Loaf in Summer 2016

© 2015 Brett Simison

I had the most fantastic time at the Bread Loaf Translators’ Conference in Ripton, VT last year, and am so happy that they’ve decided to make the translation conference a yearly tradition. This year there’s an all-new, star-studded team running the conference from June 3 – 9, 2016: this year’s faculty will include Esther Allen, Geoffrey Brock, Karen Emmerich, and David Hinton, led by Bread Loaf stalwart Jennifer Grotz. It’s hard to imagine a more stellar faculty to hone your skills with. Guests this year include Katie Dublinski, Associate Publisher, Graywolf Press; Susan Harris, Editorial Director, Words Without Borders; Tynan Kogane, Editor, New Directions; Carolyn Kuebler, Editor, New England Review; and Kaija Straumanis, Editorial Director, Open Letter.

Participants are sorted into workshops of various levels, and a little bird just told me that a few spots remain open in the translation manuscript workshops, in which you can get critiqued on a translation of up to 4000 words.

I loved the week I spent at Bread Loaf last year – lovely surroundings (hiking trails everywhere), delicious, wholesome food, Robert Frost’s cabin just down the road, convivial atmosphere. As a bonus, the Orion Environmental Writers’ Conference takes place at the same time, so you get to interact with the writers who came up the mountain for that program – there are joint readings, too, and all meals are at communal tables, so there are lots of opportunities to meet and chat (and yes, you can also just sit by yourself in a corner if that’s what you prefer).

To apply, and for information on fees and scholarship aid, visit the Bread Loaf website.

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Report on the Bridge Series’s Contracts panel

All year The Bridge Series in collaboration with the PEN Translation Committee has been putting on informational panels at the Center for Fiction concerning different aspects of the professional/business side of literary translation. The most recent one was on contracts, addressing questions like: What terms should be in your contract, and how can you go about getting them? The speakers included agent Jacqueline Ko, editor Juliet Grimes, and translator Shelley Frisch, moderated by Translation Committee co-chair Alex Zucker. I wasn’t able to attend, but Lyn Miller-Lachmann went, and now she’s posted a blow-by-blow writeup on her blog. She also includes links to her reports on the two previous sessions in the series. So if you wanted to go but couldn’t, this is your chance to find out what went on.

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2016 Best Translated Book Award Finalists Announced

So here they are, the finalists lists for both the poetry and prose Best Translated Book Awards! Now in its 9th year, the BTBA gives $5000 each to the winning authors and translators in each category. This year’s longlists are here, and the winners will be announced on Wednesday, May 4th at 7:00 p.m., both online at Three Percent and live in person at The Folly in NYC (92 W. Houston St.). You might be able to read your way through the shortlists before then if you start right now.

Here, with no further ado, les shortlists!

Poetry:

Rilke Shake by Angélica Freitas, translated from the Portuguese by Hilary Kaplan (Brazil, Phoneme Media)

Empty Chairs: Selected Poems by Liu Xia, translated from the Chinese by Ming Di and Jennifer Stern (China, Graywolf)

Load Poems Like Guns: Women’s Poetry from Herat, Afghanistan, edited and translated from the Persian by Farzana Marie (Afghanistan, Holy Cow! Press)

Silvina Ocampo by Silvina Ocampo, translated from the Spanish by Jason Weiss (Argentina, NYRB)

The Nomads, My Brothers, Go Out to Drink from the Big Dipper by Abdourahman A. Waberi, translated from the French by Nancy Naomi Carlson (Djibouti, Seagull Books)

Sea Summit by Yi Lu, translated from the Chinese by Fiona Sze-Lorrain (China, Milkweed)

 

Fiction:

A General Theory of Oblivion by José Eduardo Agualusa, translated from the Portuguese by Daniel Hahn (Angola, Archipelago Books)

Arvida by Samuel Archibald, translated from the French by Donald Winkler (Canada, Biblioasis)

The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante, translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein (Italy, Europa Editions)

The Physics of Sorrow by Georgi Gospodinov, translated from the Bulgarian by Angela Rodel (Bulgaria, Open Letter)

Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera, translated from the Spanish by Lisa Dillman (Mexico, And Other Stories)

Moods by Yoel Hoffmann, translated from the Hebrew by Peter Cole (Israel, New Directions)

The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector, translated from the Portuguese by Katrina Dodson (Brazil, New Directions)

The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli, translated from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney (Mexico, Coffee House Press)

War, So Much War by Mercè Rodoreda, translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent (Spain, Open Letter)

Murder Most Serene by Gabrielle Wittkop, translated from the French by Louise Rogers Lalaurie (France, Wakefield Press)

Best of luck to all. May the best books win!

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Soeurette Diehl Fraser Award for Best Translation Announced

A little bird just told me that the 2016 Soeurette Diehl Fraser Award for the Best Translation of a Book awarded by the Texas Institute of Letters has gone to Marian Schwartz for her translation of Leo Tolstoy’s classic Anna Karenina. Congratulations, Marian! For those of you up-and-coming Russian translators who would like a chance to learn at Marian’s elbow, I recommend you sharpen your pencils and get your applications together to have her as your mentor next year.

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Apply Now for a 2016 ALTA Emerging Translator Mentorship

This is the second year the American Literary Translators Association has offered a mentorship program for emerging translators, and this year the number of languages in which translators are invited to apply has been expanded. The languages for this year’s mentorships are: French, Polish, Russian, and any Singaporean language. Applicants must be translating out of these languages into English. Applicants for the Singaporean mentorship may be translating from Malay, Mandarin, and/or Tamil, but will only be considered for the program if the author(s) they translate are Singaporean and not from some other country where these languages are used. Those selected will be assigned a paid mentor who will work one-on-one with them on their translation projects for a period of one year. They will also receive funding to attend the ALTA conference.

You’ll find complete information about the ALTA Emerging Translator Mentorship Program here, and the application form is here. You have until May 15, 2016 to submit your application.

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2016 Close Approximations Winners Announced

For the second year, Asymptote Journal has hosted a set of translation awards (with $1000 prizes) in three different categories, and the winners (and runners-up) have just been announced:

POETRY WINNER: Marie Silkeberg and co-translator Kelsi Vanada for their translation of Silkeberg’s “The Cities” from the Swedish

POETRY RUNNER-UP: Sophie Seita for her translation of Uljana Wolf’s “Subsisters” from the German

FICTION WINNER: Ruth Diver for her translation of Sophie Pujas’s Street Rounds in Paris from the French

FICTION RUNNER-UP: Jason Woodruff for his translation of Kim Kyung-uk’s “Spray” from the Korean

NONFICTION WINNER: Sean Gasper Bye for his translation of Filip Springer’s Miedzianka: The History of a Disappearance from the Polish

NONFICTION RUNNER-UP: Ona Bantjes-Ràfols for her translation of Albert Casals’s The World on Wheels from the Catalan

For more information about the prize and books and statements by the judges (Margaret Jull Costa, Ottilie Mulzet, and Michael Hofmann) see the Asymptote Journal website.

 

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2016 Dublin, Man Booker International Shortlists Announced

It was a big week for the big international prizes. On Tuesday the Dublin International Literary Award announced its shortlist (including, to my delight, a book I translated), and on Wednesday the Man Booker International Prize followed suit. Both are among the biggest prizes around (£100,000 and £50,000 respectively). The Dublin Award is open to international literature written in English or any other language and translated into English (books are nominated by public libraries around the world.), and the Man Booker International Prize is offered specifically for literature in translation. In the case of a win, either prize comes with a £25,000 purse for the translator, making these two the most generous prizes around. They also come with a great deal of publicity and thus public attention for the featured books. I’m very happy to see translated literature getting so much attention.

And here are the shortlists:

Dublin International Literary Award:

Outlaws   by Javier Cercas (Spanish) Translated from the Spanish by Anne McLean
Academy Street by Mary Costello (Irish) First Novel
Your Fathers, Where Are They? And The Prophets, Do They Live Forever? by Dave Eggers  (American)
The End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck (German) Translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky
A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James (Jamaican)
Diary of the Fall by Michel Laub (Brazilian) Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa
Our Lady of the Nile   by Scholastique Mukasonga (Rwandan) First Novel. Translated from French by Melanie Mauthner
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill (American)
Lila by Marilynne Robinson (American)
Family Life   by Akhil Sharma (Indian-American)

Man Booker International Prize:

A General Theory of Oblivion  (Harvill Secker), José Eduardo Agualusa (Angola), translated by Daniel Hahn (UK)
The Story of the Lost Child (Europa Editions), Elena Ferrante (Italy), translated by Ann Goldstein (USA)
The Vegetarian  (Portobello Books), Han Kang (South Korea), translated by Deborah Smith (UK)
A Strangeness in My Mind  (Faber & Faber), Orhan Pamuk (Turkey), translated by Ekin Oklap (Turkey)
A Whole Life  (Picador), Robert Seethaler (Austria), translated by Charlotte Collins (UK)
The Four Books  (Chatto & Windus), Yan Lianke  (China), translated by Carlos Rojas (USA)

For more information on the books and the prizes, see the Dublin and Man Booker websites. The prize-winning books will be announced May 16 (Man Booker) and June 9 (Dublin).

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London Book Fair/Publishers Weekly Literary Translation Initiative Award Announced

Translation is alive and well at the London Book Fair, as I saw with my own eyes when I visited a few years ago. Lots of translators, lots of translation events, and even a Literary Translators’ Centre where weary translators can come to rest for a minute and chat with each other and their editors between events. And for the last few years, the London Book Fair together with Publishers Weekly have been giving out a Literary Translation Initiative Award to honor an organization that has contributed substantially to the international conversation around translation. Like all the LBF’s International Excellence Awards, this prize goes to a recipient located outside the U.K. This year’s recipient of the Literary Translation Initiative Award is the incredible online journal Words Without Borders that has pioneered making literature in translation available online in an attractive and easily accessible format since 2003. Founded by Alane Salierno Mason, Dedi Felman, and Samantha Schnee, WWoB quickly grew into a vibrant publication with many facets and contributors under the stewardship of Editorial Director Susan Harris and Executive Director Karen Phillips leading a great team.

Last year, the award went to the online translation journal Asymptote, and before that, to the Best Translated Book Award. I’m very happy to see all these fine organizations honored.

Congratulations, Words Without Borders!

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Translation on Tap in NYC, April 16 – 30, 2016

Among other things, late April this year brings us the PEN World Voices Festival (PWV) with several translation events organized by the indefatigable PEN Translation Committee chaired by Allison Markin Powell and Alex Zucker.

Tuesday, April 19:

The Bridge Series: Contracts edition. Translators Alex Zucker and Shelley Frisch, publisher Juliet Grames and agent Jacqueline Ko will provide the skinny on translation contracts and what you should be looking for in them. RSVP recommended, more information here. The Center for Fiction, 17 E. 47th St., 7:00 p.m.

Wednesday, April 27:

(In)verse: Poets Translate Each Other: Featuring translator/poets Flávia Rocha, Idra Novey, Melcion Mateu, and Rowan Ricardo Phillips reading their reciprocal translations in honor of National Poetry Month. More information here. Poets House, 10 River Terrace, 7:00 p.m.

Thursday, April 28

Translating Activism: Ayotzinapa and Beyond (PWV), with Sophiee Hughes, Jen Hofer, Cristina RiveraGarza, Omar Berrada. More information and ticket reservations here. Dixon Place, 161A Chrystie St., 6:00 p.m.

Friday, April 29

Translation Slam (PWV) – this is always one of everyone’s favorite festival events, curated as ever by M.C. Michael Moore. With Luis Felipe Fabre, Abdellah Taïa, and a quartet of stalwart translators who’ll be facing off in front of the audience. More information and ticket reservations here. Nuyorican Poets Cafe, 236 East 3rd St., 6:30 p.m.

Saturday, April 30:

Translating Nonfiction: When Words Become Walls (PWV), with Ezra E. Fitz, Elizabeth Boburg, Lydia Cacho, Marjolijn de Jager, Sophie Hughes. More information and ticket reservations here. ICNY Instituto Cervantes New York, 211 E. 49th St., 2:00 p.m.

Also Saturday, April 30:

Making Translation Matter (PWV): a birthday tribute to Edith Grossman. Featuring Esther Allen, Margaret B. Carson, Jonathan Cohen, Jonathan Galassi, Jaime Manrique, Erroll McDonald, and John Siciliano. more information and ticket reservations here. ICNY Instituto Cervantes New York, 211 E. 49th St., 4:00 p.m.

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Subscribe to Literature in Translation

I’ve seen various smaller publishers who specialize in literature in translation offer subscriptions over the years, but this is the first time I’ve seen an actual bookstore do so. Book Culture, an independent bookstore based in Morningside Heights with a branch on Columbus Ave., has just announced a handful of new subscription plans, and one of them is specifically for literature in translation, to be presented in a selection containing both new and classic works curated by Book Culture staff member Cari Kilbride. To me, it sounds like a great idea. You can sign up for quarterly, bi-monthly, or monthly subscriptions to be delivered to you by mail, with a deeper discount level at each tier. More information here.

And if you’d like to go right to the cutting-edge source (the publishers bringing you these works), some translation-centric publishing houses that offer significantly-discounted subscription packages of their own include Archipelago, New Vessel Press, Action Books, New Directions, Two Lines Press, Open Letter, and Ugly Duckling.

Happy reading!

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