Thrilled and honored to be the recipient of the Astrid Lindgren Prize
Every three years, the Federación Internacional de Traductores (FIT) holds a World Congress during which awards and prizes are presented to distinguish professionals from all over the world for their work in very many fields, from translation of fiction and non-fiction to solidarity within the community of translators and interpreters. And this year I have had the great fortune to receive one: the Astrid Lindgren Prize for the translation of literature for children and young adults! The ceremony was held in Cuba of all places at the beginning of June. ...
The History of ACE Traductores
ACE Traductores, the Spanish association of literary translators, will be forty years old in November 2023. To pave the way for the celebrations, its journal, Vasos Comunicantes, has recently published a series of three articles that review its entire history and, ultimately, the recent history of Spanish translation. Here are the three instalments: the first, the second and the third. Furthermore, in this same issue, no. 57, a fascinating interview with Catalina Martínez Muñoz has appeared. And it also includes a profile of Esther Benítez, a historical translator and activist ...
International (and Virtual) Translation Day
Here we have more talks and interviews, three to be precise, to celebrate September 30th, International Translation Day (ITD), in this virtual year. To begin with, Belén Santana, who won Spain’s National Translation Award last year with Memorias de una osa polar by Yoko Tawada (Anagrama), and who is also a lecturer at the University of Salamanca, spoke in an interview about the profession, the challenges it presents and the satisfactions it gives. Meanwhile, at La Lumbre bookshop in Madrid, Amaya García Gallego and Pablo Moíño Sánchez, moderated by Mateo P. ...
A Brief Reflection / on Translation Awards
Turkish-into-Spanish translator Rafael Carpintero has recently received the Best Translation Award 2018 at the Estado Crítico Awards for his translation of Sabahattin Ali's Madona con abrigo de piel (Salamandra). And he has written a very insightful (and very funny) article on translation awards, which you can read here (in ...
Juan de Sola Takes Home the Ángel Crespo Award
Juan de Sola has won the XXI Ángel Crespo Translation Award, given out by ACEC, Cedro and the Gremi d’Editors de Catalunya, for his translation of Correspondencia 1914-1922 by Marcel Proust and Jacques Rivière. The book was published last year by La Uña Rota and De Sola was also in charge of the preface and the notes. ...
Concha Cardeñoso Wins the Esther Benítez Award 2018
On the 1st of December, at 7 pm, ACE Traductores will present the Esther Benítez Award 2018 to Concha Cardeñoso for her Spanish translation of Daphne de Maurier's My Cousin Rachel, published by Alba. The ceremony will be held in Madrid, at Casa del Lector, the headquarters of ACE Traductores. ...
The Vanguard of Literary Change
'Translators are the vanguard of literary change: we need better recognition', says the illustrious Daniel Hahn in a great article he has written for The Guardian, which you can read here. Last year, Daniel won €25,000 at the International Dublin Literary Award for his translation of A General Theory of Oblivion, by Angolan author José Eduardo Agualusa. With half of that money, and the backing of the Society of Authors’ Translators Association (TA) and The British Council, he funded an award designed to recognise a great literary translation debut ...
Anthea Bell, Grande Dame of Translation
If you only read one interview with a translator this year, let it be this one by Claire Armitstead, who speaks to the charming Anthea Bell. It was published in The Guardian in 2013. Thoroughly ...
An Interview in Orlandiana about the Esther Benítez Award
There’s a great blog called Orlandiana that talks about the ceremony at which I received the 12th Esther Benítez Award, bestowed by ACE Traductores on the 15th of December at Casa del Lector. They also interview me. Thank you so much! You can read it ...
Off to Madrid to Receive the Esther Benítez Award on the 15th of December
I’m off to Madrid in a few weeks to receive the Esther Benítez Award, bestowed by ACE Traductores to honour the best translation published in Spain last year! I am on cloud nine, it’s really wonderful to have won this award, voted by literary translators from all over Spain! Furthermore, it’s for my translation of La noche de los niños (God Help the Child), a book by Toni Morrison that took me to BILTC at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and has brought me joy on ...
My Translation of God Help the Child Has Been Shortlisted for the Esther Benítez Award!
I’m over the moon! I made the shortlist for the Esther Benítez Award, bestowed by ACE Traductores, for my translation of La noche de los niños by Toni Morrison (Lumen), a book that has given me so much! Even better, I’m in great company with Rita da Costa, shortlisted for El camino estrecho al norte profundo by Richard Flanagan (Literatura Random House), María Enguix for Cuando el diablo salió del baño by Sophie Divry (Malpaso), Julia Osuna for Hasta arriba by W. E. Bowman (Blackie Books) and Eugenia Vázquez-Nacarino ...
So, Can I Be Happy?
I’ve been reading books in Anagrama’s Narrativas Hispánicas collection all my life. And now suddenly I’ve translated a novel by Tina Vallès for them. It’s called La memoria del árbol and it won the II Premio Llibres Anagrama earlier this year. And it’s simple and complex and wonderful. Toda la vida leyendo libros de Narrativas Hispánicas de Anagrama y ahora, puf, he traducido uno ¡de @tinavalles_! «¿Puedo ponerme contento?» pic.twitter.com/2qn3gW45Gf — Carlos Mayor (@CarlosMayor) June 12, ...
Writers and Translators Honoured by the Premio Strega Europeo
And here’s the shortlist for Italy's Premio Strega Europeo 2017, which gives € 3,000 to the winning author and, starting this year, also € 1,500 to their translator: Mathias Enard, Bussola (e/o), translated by Yasmina Melaouah; Jenny Erpenbeck, Voci del verbo andare (Sellerio), translated by Ada Vigliani; Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Tutto quello che non ricordo (Iperborea), translated by Alessandro Bassini; László Krasznahorkai, Satantango (Bompiani), translated by Dora Várnai, and Ali Smith, L’una e l’altra (Sur), translated by Federica Aceto. Congratulations to all ten! Los finalistas del Premio Strega Europeo 2017. ...