So much for timely trip reports about award ceremonies! That
doesn’t mean I’m not still thrilled to say, more than two weeks later, that Oliver Ready received
the 2015 Read Russia Prize for his translation of Vladimir Sharov’s До
и во время, which Dedalus Books
published with the title Before and
During. I accepted the award for Oliver and am very excited for all
involved: for Oliver, for Sharov, whom I met through Oliver, and for Dedalus
Books.
Recognizing Oliver felt doubly appropriate because his
Crime and Punishment translation was shortlisted
for this year’s award, too. Given my interest in contemporary Russian literature, I’m especially
happy Oliver won for the Sharov book—the decision came, by the way, through unanimous
vote—both because I hope it draws attention to present-day writers and because
I read and admired (previous
post) Oliver’s translation.
Read Russia commended classics, too, by giving a special
jury award to two new translations of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina: Rosamund Bartlett’s translation was published by Oxford
University Press and Marian Schwartz’s by Yale University Press. The jury’s
statements on both awards are online here.
I should note that this Read Russia Prize was for Russian-to-English translations
only.
The Read Russia evening also included a talk from Gary Saul
Morson, the man who taught me War and Peace
twice: he spoke on the topic of “Because Everyone Needs a Little Russian
Literature.” I’d wondered, in a previous post (about
the Read Russia shortlist), if Dr. Morson took the title from a Read Russia bumper
sticker. He did. My notes about his talk, alas, are even more inadequate than
usual, most likely due to a combination of plain old tiredness after three days
at BEA and excitement for Oliver.
I am happy to report, though, that, among other things, Dr.
Morson quoted from a book by his pseudonym Alicia Chudo, noted the sense of
moral urgency that Russian literature conveys, and spoke of literary characters
as possible people, a formulation I like very much. Best of all, he read aloud,
from translations: when I was a student, undergrad and grad, I didn’t
understand why he read aloud to us, but have come to realize in recent years how
much his readings helped me learn to hear the shadings of literary voices.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Alex Cigale gave
me a copy of the spring/summer 2015 issue of Atlanta Review: Alex
edited the issue and it includes four or five or six dozen translations of
Russian poems. Alex pulled together a fantastic roster of fifty poets (Shamshad Abdullaev
to Ivan Zhdanov, if taken in the Roman alphabet’s A to Z) and several dozen translators, many of whom
I know and have heard read from and/or speak about their work. I’ve only read a
small sliver of the issue—every time I open the journal, I get happily stuck on
Alyssa Dinega Gillespie’s lush translation of a Polina Barskova poem that starts with
“Sweetness of the sweetest slumber/Sweet is sweet is sweet is dream” because I
love what Alyssa does with rhythm and rhyme—but I can’t wait to read more, poet
by poet, translator by translator. Alex reminded me that readers can get tastes
of the poems (as well as background) from the Atlanta Review
Facebook group, where posts often include lots of links. If you’re looking
for very short notes, there’s also Twitter!
Disclaimers: The
usual, including work for Read Russia. Thank you to Alex Cigale for Atlanta Review.
Up Next: Trip
report, Part Two, BookExpo America book fair and event report. And two books:
Eugene Vodolazkin’s Solovyov and Larionov,
which I’ll start translating this summer, meaning soon, and Sergei Nosov’s Член общества, или Голодное время
(something like Member of the Society or
A Time of Hunger), the sad-but-funny story of a man’s life after selling
all his Dostoevsky. And then: I’m currently reading Elena Minkina-Taycher’s
The Rebinder Effect, which I’m
enjoying very much. Rebinder didn’t
catch me on several previous tries so I’m glad I kept trying because I’m finding
it very, very readable. After that, I’ll be starting my Big Book Award finalist
marathon, beginning with Guzel’ Iakhina’s Zuleikha
Opens Her Eyes, which I’ve already started…
