Goethe-Institut Announces 2018 Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize Shortlist

The Goethe-Institut New York is pleased to present the shortlist of the 2018 Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize: Isabel Fargo Cole, for her translation of Wolfgang Hilbig’s Old Rendering Plant, published by Two Lines Press; David Dollenmayer, for his translation of Rüdiger Safranski’s Goethe: Life as a Work of Art, published by Liveright, a division of W. W. Norton & Company; and Stefan Tobler, for his translation of Arno Geiger’s The Old King in His Exile, published by Restless Books.

The shortlist was determined by a jury of five, consisting of Shelley Frisch (chair), Bettina Abarbanell, Ross Benjamin, John Hargraves, and Susan Harris. The winner will be announced in early May and the award will be presented at a prize ceremony held at the Goethe-Institut New York on June 7.

The Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize is awarded annually each spring to honor an outstanding literary translation from German into English published in the USA the previous year. The translator of the winning translation receives $10,000. Funded by the German government, the prize was established in 1996. This is the second year that a shortlist has been announced.

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