Melville House Books

Best Translated Book: Fiction

Best Translated Book: Poetry

The first Best Translated Book prize was announced at Melville House in Brooklyn last night, to a packed house made up of some of the independent publishing scene’s leading critics, translators, editors and booksellers. Among those in attendance were New Directions head Barbara Epler, New York Review Books head Edwin Frank, indie publisher of the year-winner Jill Schoolman of Archipelago, Ugly Duckling Press publisher Matvei Yankelevich, and of course from Melville House co-publisher Valerie Merians. Organizer Chad Post, who runs the Open Letter Press, and author and critic Francisco Goldman, who was the evening’s mc, announced that the prize for best translated book of poetry went to For the Fightinng Spirit of the Walnut, by Takshi Hiraide, translated from the Japanese by Sawako Nakayasu and published by New Directions; and the prize for fiction went to Attila Bartis‘ Tranquility, translated from the Hungarian by Imre Goldstein and published by Archipelago.

Dennis Johnson is the founder of MobyLives, and the co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House.