Winner of long-running translation competition announced by School of Languages, Cultures and Societies
The School of Languages, Cultures and Societies has hosted the John Dryden Translation Competition, which was established in 1982 and changes host institution roughly every ten years, since 2018.
The School of Languages, Cultures and Societies (LCS) has announced the winner of the John Dryden Translation Competition, an annual international competition for unpublished literary translations from any language and genre into English.
This year’s First Prize is shared between Jackie Smith for Journey to Laredo, translated from Arno Geiger’s Reise nach Laredo (German), and Michelle Szobody for Navigating Exile: Seafaring, Earth-Striding, Translating, translated from an anonymous author, The Exeter Book (Old English).
Third Prize goes to Kate Webster for Fishscope, translated from Patryk Zalaszewski’s Luneta z rybiej głowy (Polish). Ian Barnett was commended for The Judge's Dreamland, translated from Carlos Gamerro’s El sueño del señor juez (Spanish).
The School of Languages, Cultures and Societies has hosted the John Dryden Translation Competition, which was established in 1982 and changes host institution roughly every ten years, since 2018. The University of Glasgow will host the competition from 2027.
The competition is administered by Professor Richard Hibbitt (LCS) with support from postgraduate interns and a wide range of colleagues from Leeds and beyond who assist with the preliminary reading process.
Commenting on this year’s competition, the joint chairs of the judges’ panel, Jacob Blakesley and Caroline Summers, said:
“One of the highlights of our year has always been the summer reading period, when we have had the opportunity to discover some of the most exciting literary translations going on today, unpublished, in languages we often do not read.
“Each year’s set of longlisted and shortlisted translations has brought something different, not only showcasing a range of approaches to the ‘task’ of the translator, but also often reflecting prevalent global concerns such as our relationship with the planet, our social responsibility for one another, or the power of human-generated language to build connection and make change.
“So, we would like to finish by saying thank you, most importantly, to all the translators who have had faith in the value of translating literature, whether fiction, poetry, or theatre. Both of us can think of Dryden translations that continue to stay with us, move us, and make us reflect on the importance of the written word, created and translated by humans.”
The prizes for the competition are sponsored by the British Comparative Literature Association and the British Centre for Literary Translation.
Listen to conversations with previous winners of the competition as part of a new series of Settee Seminars podcasts entitled ‘Translators on Translation’, hosted by Ilkley Literature Festival / Word Up North.
The full list of shortlisted translators is below:
- Sana R. Chaudhry for A Sort of Madness, translated from Rahman Abbas’s Ek tarha ka pagalpan (Urdu)
- Edward Maltby for The Work of Birds, translated from Marica Bodrozic’s Die Arbeit der Voegel (German)
- Freya Tong for Falling Tide, translated from Jun Dale de Man Xiansheng’s Luochao (Chinese).
