The shortlist for a still fairly new, but very worthwhile award has been announced. The Best Translated Book Award highlights work in translation (of course), a corner of the literary world that gets far less attention in the U.S. than it deserves.
“The Best Translated Book Awards launched in 2007 as a way of bringing attention to great works of international literature. Original translations (no reprints or retranslations) published between December 2009 and November 2010 are eligible for this year’s award. Quality of the original book and the artistry of the English translation are the criteria used in determining the winning titles.
Thanks to the support of Amazon.com, each winning author and translator will receive a $5,000 cash prize.”
The shortlist comprises ten books, and six languages are represented:
The Literary Conference by César Aira, translated from the Spanish by Katherine Silver
The Golden Age by Michal Ajvaz, translated from the Czech by Andrew Oakland
A Life on Paper by Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud, translated from the French by Edward Gauvin
The Jokers by Albert Cossery, translated from the French by Anna Moschovakis
Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky
Hocus Bogus by Romain Gary (writing as Émile Ajar), translated from the French by David Bellos
The True Deceiver by Tove Jansson, translated from the Swedish by Thomas Teal
On Elegance While Sleeping by Emilio Lascano Tegui, translated from the Spanish by Idra Novey
Agaat by Marlene Van Niekerk, translated from the Afrikaans by Michiel Heyns
Georg Letham: Physician and Murderer by Ernst Weiss, translated from the German by Joel Rotenberg
