Article
March 2024 translation news roundup
Apr 12, 2024 |
By Giovanna Lomanto
Prizes
- The Bait AlGhasham DarArab Translation Prize is now accepting submissions for its 2025 prize(opens in a new tab), which honors Arabic literature and its translation to English. The prize has two submission opportunities—a Translator’s Category(opens in a new tab) and an Author’s Category(opens in a new tab).
- The National Book Critics Circle(opens in a new tab) announced the 2023 winners of their annual awards, offered in six different categories. There were three winners in translation: Kim Hyesoon and translator Don Mee Choi won the poetry category for Phantom Pain Wings(opens in a new tab) (New Directions), Tahir Hazmat Izgil and translator Joshua L. Freeman won the John Leonard Prize for Waiting to Be Arrested at Night: a Uyghur Poet’s Memoir of China’s Genocide (opens in a new tab)(Penguin Press), and Tezer Özlü and translator Maureen Freely won the Gregg Barrios Book in Translation Award for Cold Nights of Childhood(opens in a new tab) (Transit Books).
- Of the six books shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Prize, Mircea Cărtărescu’s(opens in a new tab) Solenoid(opens in a new tab) (Deep Vellum), translated from the original Romanian by Sean Cotter, is among the hard hitters. Alexis Wright(opens in a new tab), who recently spoke at our event with The International Library, is also a finalist for the prize.
- Every year, Lambda Literary Awards(opens in a new tab) honor the literary accomplishments of LGBTQ+ authors in 26 categories. Among this years’ finalists, Lambda nominated a novel in translation for the best book in Transgender Fiction: The Rage Letters(opens in a new tab) by Valérie Bah; translator Kama La Mackerel (Metonymy Press).
News
- Small Press Distributions, the primary nonprofit book distributor in the U.S., recently announced that it was shutting down operations effective immediately(opens in a new tab).
- Gallery Marquee (699 Main St., Fitchburg, MA) presents an exhibit called “Found in Translation,”(opens in a new tab) which explores the relationship between literature, language, poetry, and visual art. The exhibit’s opening reception will take place on April 6.
- The University of Chicago’s Center for East Asian Studies invites applications for a Translation Workshop on the tale written in Classical Chinese(opens in a new tab), as part of the NEH Translations and Scholarly Editions project for a new complete annotated English translation of Pu Songling’s 蒲松齡 Liaozhai zhiyi 聊齋誌異. The program will run July 15-19, 2024, and applications are due by May 1.
- Dezső Kosztolányi, one of Hungary’s premiere literary writers and translators from the 1800’s, had historically only had fragments of his first significant work as a literary translator. This month, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences recovered the full manuscript for his translation of Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.(opens in a new tab)
- Vanderbilt University announced the creation of a new trade series, Global Black Writers in Translation(opens in a new tab), an initiative to honor writers of African Descent, published bilingually.
- The International Armenian Literary Alliance is now accepting applications(opens in a new tab) for IALA’s fourth annual mentorship program. The program will run July 1-August 31, 2024, with mentorships for writers of the novel, memoir, creative nonfiction, short story, poetry as well as literary translation from Eastern or Western Armenian into English. Apply before April 14, 2024.
- The Africa Institute in now accepting applications to the Global Africa Translation Fellowship(opens in a new tab) until June 1, 2024.
Recommended Reads
- On LitHub, read translator Nada Hammad’s love letter to Gaza(opens in a new tab).
- Gabino Iglesias, the new horror columnist at the New York Times(opens in a new tab), write of Through the Night Like a Snake: “There stories—relentlessly unsettling as they are—serve as a fantastic introduction to a growing movement that’s bound to enrich, and help diversify, speculative fiction for years to come.”
- Patrick St Michel recently wrote an article for “The Guardian”(opens in a new tab) about the “Japanese rock controversy” of the 1970’s, wherein a band called Happy End made headlines for singing in their native language, allowing the public to translate their lyrics, rather than translating their lyrics for the public.
- Layla Martinez’s Woodworm (trans. Sophie Hughes and Annie McDermott) was included in Polygon’s “Must-Read Books of Spring 2024.”(opens in a new tab) Rachel Conrad writes: “This book has everything, from witches to saints to angels that look like praying mantises to some of the most unsettling portrayals of ghosts that I’ve come across in a long time. Trust me when I say that you’ll never look at the space between the end of your bed and the floor the same way again.”
- Jeremy Klemin’s article in The Atlantic regales “The Last Frontier of Machine Translation,”(opens in a new tab) detailing the inconsistencies within artificial intelligence bots in literary translation.
Author
Giovanna Lomanto
Giovanna Lomanto is a poet and essayist with a tendency to play the same song on repeat until she has memorized every last note. She received her BA in English at U.C. Berkeley and finished her MFA at NYU, during which time she published two poetry collections and two mixed media chapbooks.
