#edited by boel westin and helen svensson

[a-chorus-of-storytellers]

“You know, Eva, I seem able to talk to you about all my great joys, all my agonies, all my thoughts - there‘s no-one else I can talk to as I do to you … the way you always listen, to whatever I tell you, is like the embrace of a friend.”

Letter to Eva Konikoff, August 1946

[godzilla-reads]

Finnish writer, artist, and political cartoonist Tove Jansson (1914-2001) is best known for her books about the Moomins. She is author of eleven novels and short story collections for adults, including The Summer Book and The True Deceiver.

📖 Letters from Tove by Tove Jansson (edited by Boel Westin and Helen Svensson; trans. Sara Death)

[womenintranslation]

The 2020 Warwick Prize for Women in Translation, judged by Amanda Hopkinson, Boyd Tonkin and Susan Bassnett, was awarded to The Eighth Life (for Brilka) by Nino Haratischvili, translated from German by Charlotte Collins and Ruth Martin, during an online event held on Thursday 26 November.

On her Translating Women blog Helen Vasallo gives a thumbs-up to the winner: “This multi-generational story of revolution and downfall strikes a endnote of possibility and new chances....I cannot recommend this extraordinary book highly enough, and I hope you will read it and love it as I did.” Read Helen’s rave review here.

The event was capped by readings from all the shortlisted titles, beginning at  00:26:00 (not to be missed: Lissie Jacquette reading from Thirteen Months of Sunrise with her week-old baby at 00:45:38):

Abigail by Magda Szabó, translated from Hungarian by Len Rix (MacLehose Press, 2020)

Happiness, As Such by Natalia Ginzburg, translated from Italian by Minna Zallmann Proctor (Daunt Books Publishing, 2019)

Lake Like a Mirror by Ho Sok Fong, translated from Chinese by Natascha Bruce (Granta Publications, 2019)

Letters from Tove by Tove Jansson, edited by Boel Westin & Helen Svensson, translated from Swedish by Sarah Death (Sort of Books, 2019)

The Eighth Life by Nino Haratischvili, translated from German by Charlotte Collins and Ruth Martin (Scribe UK, 2019)

Thirteen Months of Sunrise by Rania Mamoun, translated from Arabic by Elisabeth Jaquette (Comma Press, 2019)

White Horse by Yan Ge, translated from Chinese by Nicky Harman (HopeRoad, 2019)

Congratulations to the prizewinning author and translators!