Strictly speaking, attending literary events in Berlin doesn’t fall within the purview of “Leipzig is Lit,” but the initial reason for my trip to the capital was related to translation work. At the end of August I had received a short-notice commission to translate the introductory essay of Sabine Scho’…
I have to admit, after having enjoyed an extended vacation with my family, I had trouble getting back into the swing of things aka everyday life in Leipzig. So I spent a lot of time of at the lake on the southern edge of town—called “Cosi” by the locals—and sleeping in. There were a few events in Berlin …
By the time you read this, I'll be on the other side of the pond. And because I've decided I will actually not work for several weeks, I'm taking a break until late August. See you on the other side.
Because I’ve only been writing this blog for a couple months, I’m still catching up on some events I’ve been attending annually for several years. One such highlight my calendar is the annual meeting of literary translators in Germany. The organization behind this mixture of conference, workshop, and r…
As already mentioned in a previous blog post, I had the honor of being part of the jury of nine that determined the winner of this year’s Best Translated Book Award in fiction. I’ve never been a part of a “real” (i.e. trial) jury, but one thing I learned is that it’s hard to get everyone to agree. The other…
How well do you know your city? Recently I had the opportunity to become more familiar with Leipzig, and even though I’ve been living here for over ten years, I managed to learn a few things in the process. The translation project was taking a small-format tourist guide on Leipzig and turning it i…
I only started this blog a couple months ago, so you might not know that I attended the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota last October. In addition to chairing a panel working class literature (Translating the Disaffected), participating in…
The past half-year I have had the honor of being a part of the jury choosing the Best Translated Book Award (for fiction), 2018. If you’ve never heard of it before, you might not necessarily view the category as self-explanatory, but actually it’s simple: books that were published in the US in the yea…