September 3, 2019—The American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) is pleased to announce the longlists for the 2019 National Translation Awards (NTA) in Poetry and Prose! 2019 marks the twenty-first year for the NTA, and the fifth year to award separate prizes in poetry and prose. The NTA, which is administered by ALTA, is the only national award for translated fiction, poetry, and literary nonfiction that includes a rigorous examination of both the source text and its relation to the finished English work.
Featuring authors writing in 13 different languages, this year’s longlists expand the prize’s dedication to literary diversity in English. The selection criteria include the quality of the finished English language book, and the quality of the translation. This year’s prose judges are Bonnie Huie, Charlotte Mandell, and Jeffrey Zuckerman. This year’s judges for poetry are Anna Deeny Morales, Cole Heinowitz, and Sholeh Wolpe.
The winning translators will receive a $2,500 cash prize each. The awards will be announced at ALTA’s annual conference, held this year at the Joseph A. Floreano Riverside Convention Center and the Hyatt Regency Rochester in Rochester, NY, from November 7-10, 2019. The shortlists will be announced at the end of September. In the meantime, ALTA will highlight each book on the longlists with features written by the judges on the ALTA blog: https://literarytranslators.wordpress.com/
The 2019 NTA Longlist in Prose (in alphabetical order by title):
Anniversaries: From a Year in the Life of Gesine Cresspahl
by Uwe Johnson
translated from the German by Damion Searls
(New York Review Books)
Berlin Alexanderplatz
by Alfred Döblin
translated from the German by Michael Hofmann
(New York Review Books)
Brother in Ice
by Alicia Kopf
translated from the Catalan by Mara Faye Lethem
(And Other Stories)
Collected Stories
by Bruno Schulz
translated from the Polish by Madeline G. Levine
(Northwestern University Press)
Comemadre
by Roque Larraquy
translated from the Spanish by Heather Cleary
(Coffee House Press)
The Houseguest
by Amparo Davila
translated from the Spanish by Audrey Harris and Matthew Gleeson
(New Directions)
In Black and White
by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki
translated from the Japanese by Phyllis I. Lyons
(Columbia University Press)
Lost Time
by Józef Czapski
translated from the French by Eric Karpeles
(New York Review Books)
The Naked Woman
by Armonía Somers
translated from the Spanish by Kit Maude
(The Feminist Press)
Öraefi: The Wasteland
by Ófeigur Sigurdsson
translated from the Icelandic by Lytton Smith
(Deep Vellum Publishing)
The Taiga Syndrome
by Cristina Rivera Garza
translated from the Spanish by Suzanne Jill Levine and Aviva Kana
(Dorothy, a publishing project & And Other Stories, forthcoming)
What’s Left of the Night
by Ersi Sotiropoulos
translated from the Greek by Karen Emmerich
(New Vessel Press)
The 2019 NTA Longlist in Poetry (in alphabetical order by title):
Architecture of Dispersed Life: Selected Poems
by Pablo de Rokha
translated from the Spanish by Urayoán Noel
(Shearsman Books)
The Color of Rivers
by Juana Castro
translated from the Spanish by Ana Valverde Osan
(Diálogos)
The Complete Cold Mountain: Poems of the Legendary Hermit Hanshan
by Hanshan
translated from the Chinese by Kazuaki Tanahashi and Peter Levitt
(Shambhala Publications)
Countersong to Walt Whitman
by Pedro Mir
translated from the Spanish by Jonathan Cohen and Donald D. Walsh
(Peepal Tree Press)
Decals
by Oliverio Girondo
translated from the Spanish by Rachel Galvin and Harris Feinsod
(Open Letter Books)
The Future Has an Appointment with the Dawn
by Tanella Boni
translated from the French by Todd Fredson
(University of Nebraska Press)
Negative Space
by Luljeta Lleshanaku
translated from the Albanian by Ani Gjika
(New Directions)
Pan Tadeusz: The Last Foray in Lithuania
by Adam Mickiewicz
translated from the Polish by Bill Johnston
(Archipelago Books)
The Popul Vuh
by Anonymous
translated from the K’iche’ by Michael Bazzett
(Milkweed Editions)
Robert the Devil
by Anonymous
translated from the French by Samuel N. Rosenberg
(Penn State University Press)
Through Naked Branches: Selected Poems of Tarjei Vesaas
by Tarjei Vesaas
translated from the Norwegian by Roger Greenwald
(Black Widow Press)
War Songs
by Antarah ibn Shaddad
translated from the Arabic by James E. Montgomery with Richard Sieburth
(Library of Arabic Literature/NYU Press)