Best Translated Book Awards announces shortlist

The shortlists for the 2015 Best Translated Book Awards were announced Tuesday at Three Percent, the website of the program in international literature at the University of Rochester in New York. Ten works of fiction and six books of poetry were named finalists for the awards.

The fiction finalist list is led by “Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay,” a bestseller by Elena Ferrante, a mysterious Italian author who writes under a pseudonym. Also making the cut from the longlist is Valeria Luiselli’s “Faces in the Crowd,” which took the Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction at the Los Angeles Times Book Prizes last month.

The winners of the Best Translated Book Awards -- both the original authors and their translators -- will each receive $5,000. The winners will be announced at an event at the Book Expo publishing conference in New York City on May 27.

The complete list of finalists, their translators and the works’ countries of origin are below.

Fiction:

“The Last Lover” by Can Xue (China), translated from Chinese by Annelise Finegan Wasmoen (Yale University Press)

“The Author and Me” by Eric Chevillard (France), translated from French by Jordan Stump (Dalkey Archive Press)

“Fantomas Versus the Multinational Vampires” by Julio Cortazar (Argentina), translated from Spanish by David Kurnick (Semiotext(e))

Pushkin Hills by Sergei Dovlatov (Russia), translated from Russian by Katherine Dovlatov (Counterpoint Press)

“Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay” by Elena Ferrante (Italy), translated from Italian by Ann Goldstein (Europa Editions)

“Things Look Different in the Light” by Medardo Fraile (Spain), translated from Spanish by Margaret Jull Costa (Pushkin Press)

“Harlequin’s Millions” by Bohumil Hrabal (Czech Republic), translated from Czech by Stacey Knecht (Archipelago Books)

“The Woman Who Borrowed Memories” by Tove Jansson (Finland), translated from Swedish by Thomas Teal and Silvester Mazzarella (NYRB)

“Faces in the Crowd” by Valeria Luiselli (Mexico), translated from Spanish by Christina MacSweeney (Coffee House Press)

“La Grande” by Juan Jose Saer (Argentina), translated from Spanish by Steve Dolph (Open Letter Books)

Poetry:

“Diorama” by Rocio Ceron (Mexico), translated from Spanish by Anna Rosenwong (Phoeneme)

“Lazy Suzie” by Suzanne Doppelt (France), translated from French by Cole Swenson (Litmus Press)

“Where Are the Trees Going?” by Venus Khoury-Ghata (Lebanon), translated from French by Marilyn Hacker (Curbstone)

“Diana’s Tree” by Alejandra Pizarnik (Argentina), translated from Spanish by Yvette Siegert (Ugly Duckling)

“Compleat Catalogue of Comedic Novelties” by Lev Rubinstein (Russia), translated from Russian by Philip Metres and Tatiana Tulchinsky (Ugly Duckling)

“End of the City Map” by Farhad Showghi (Germany), translated from German by Rosmarie Waldrop (Burning Deck)

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