Shortlists for the 2016 Read Russia Translation
Prize (the global prize, for all languages) were announced last week
for four categories: nineteenth-century classics (three finalists), twentieth-century
literature until 1990 (three finalists), contemporary literature (four
finalists), and poetry (three finalists). Since Alexandra Guzeva’s article for Russia
Beyond the Headlines covers things so well (and since it’s a beautiful beach
day!), I’ll send you to her, right
here, for all the details.
I do want to add, though, that I’m very excited that Laurus, my translation of Eugene
Vodolazkin’s Лавр for Oneworld Publications,
is on the very varied contemporary literature list. There are two other
English-language translations that are finalists on, respectively, the
nineteenth-century and poetry lists: Michael Pursglove’s translation of Ivan
Turgenev’s Smoke and Virgin Soil
for Alma Classics, and Philip Metres and Dimitri Psurtsev’s translation of I
Burned at the Feast: Selected Poems of Arseny Tarkovsky, published by Cleveland State University Poetry Center.
It makes me very happy to see this recognition for translations of Tarkovsky’s poetry.
It also makes me very happy that this is Laurus’s second shortlist: I was pleasantly
surprised to find the translation on the Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize
shortlist earlier this year, along with seven other books, including Stephen Pearl’s
translation of Ivan Goncharov’s The Same Old Story, published by Alma Classics. The award was shared by Philip Roughton, who translated Jón Kalman Stefánsson’s The
Heart of Man for MacLehose Press, and Paul Vincent and John Irons,
who translated 100 Dutch-Language Poems for
Holland Park Press.
- Melanie Moore’s translation of Tatyana Shcherbina’s Multiple Personalities, published by Glagoslav, was on Read Russia’s contemporary literature longlist. (That longlist, though, is so short it’s short!) Melanie also translated Margarita Khemlin’s The Investigator for Glagoslav; here’s my previous post about The Investigator and here’s a review of Melanie’s translation written by Lori Feathers for World Literature Today.
- The U.S. edition of Catlantis, written by Anna Starobinets, translated by Jane Bugaeva, illustrated by Andrzej Klimowski, and published here by New York Review Books, will be available in mid-September. I loved this fun kids’ book (previous post), which is already out in the U.K. from Pushkin Press. Catlantis is a wonderful gift for cat lovers of all ages; my previous post includes a rare Lizok’s Bookshelf cat photo.
- Yana Vagner’s To the Lake, published by Skyscraper Publications, will be out this fall, too, by an unnamed translator. I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, known in Russian as Вонгозеро.
- Looking back at the post I wrote for the very first Women in Translation month, in 2014, at the invitation of Meytal Radzinski, who writes Biblibio, I found a few items to update. I mentioned, above, Melanie’s translation of Margarita Khemlin’s The Investigator, which is already available and want to mention that Margarita’s Klotsvog (previous post) will be on the way in a couple years, too: I’m translating it for the Russian Library series published by Columbia University Press. My translation of Marina Stepnova’s The Women of Lazarus came out last fall from World Editions and is on the list for the Edinburgh International Book Festival’s First Book Award, along with the aforementioned Laurus plus my translation of Vadim Levental’s Masha Regina, also for Oneworld. And I’m finishing up Marina’s Italian Lessons (known in Russian as Безбожный переулок) for World Editions now (previous post). Some of the other writers I mentioned are already more available in translation now and/or have more books coming soon: Carol Apollonio’s translation of Alisa Ganieva’s The Mountain and the Wall (Праздничная гора) (mentioned here) is already out from Deep Vellum Publishing and Carol’s translation of Alisa’s Bride and Groom (previous post) is on the way. Also: Ludmila Ulitskaya’s The Kukotsky Enigma is out this month from Northwestern University Press, in Diane Nemec Ignashev's translation.
- Finally, on (yet) another personal note, I think I’ve already mentioned somewhere along the way that I’m working on Guzel Yakhina’s Zuleikha Opens Her Eyes for Oneworld Publications and loving it—one of my favorite aspects of translation is enjoying a book all over again when I translate. Of course there are many phases of “all over again” with all the editing, revising, proofing, correcting, and checking! Which is why I have to love a book (previous post on Zuleikha) to translate it…
- And now, truly finally, since I could go on and on and but have already written enough and, yes, the beach beckons: several of you have mentioned other books written by Russian women that you’re working on, that will be published in English translation within the next year or two, so I know there’s more to come. I’ll be watching for details on those so I can add them to future translation lists!
