This week, we’ve been celebrating the shortlisting of three of our translated titles in the 2011 Best Translated Book Awards, presented by Three Percent. In the fiction category, Katherine Silver’s translation of The Literary Conference by César Aira has been shortlisted, as has Susan Bernofsky’s translation of Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck, and in the poetry category, Henry Israeli and Shpresa Qatipi’s translation of Child of Nature by Luljeta Lleshanaku has also been recognized. In honor of the occasion, here’s one of Israeli and Qatipi’s translations from Child of Nature:
WINTER PRELUDE
Darkness has not yet fallen
and from a neighbor’s yard
comes a hammer’s pounding -
the apiary mended for winter’s hibernation.
What good is it knowing who switched off the light?
It’s better not to see that face.
Let the last mouthful of light devour itself.
Let the door of the coal stove
enjoy the fading purple glow.
You are old enough
to sit close by with a black poker.
When the room cools down
we both dream of the gypsy woman
the rattling of her silver earrings
her full breasts, and her premonition:
a blue-eyed woman
the birth of six children.
- Luljeta Lleshanaku
