The Cultural Services of the French Embassy has announced a new award, the Albertine Prize (which shares a name with the lovely bookstore run by the embassy), to honor a French-language work in English-language translation published in the U.S. over the previous academic year. This $10,000 prize honors both the original work and the translation, according to the press release sent out with the longlist this week, though I was sorry to see that the press release fails outright to mention the names of the longlisted translators, and also that only 20% of the prize money will go to the translator of the winning book. Let’s hope that the translator-appreciation part of this award is still a work-in-progress. The ten-book longlist was assembled by the Albertine staff and approved by the prize’s co-chairs (Lydia Davis and François Busnel). The winner of the award will now be selected by you and everyone else who chooses to participate in crowd-source-judging the competition. Voting will take place in two rounds, so you can start by voting for your favorite book from the longlist between now and April 14, 2017, and then come back to vote again between April 14 and 30 after the shortlist of three finalists is announced. Here are this year’s longlisted books:
- Couple Mechanics (Moment d’un couple) by Nelly Alard, translated by Adriana Hunter (Other Press)
- Constellation (Constellation) by Adrien Bosc, translated by Willard Wood (Other Press)
- The Heart (Réparer les vivants) by Maylis De Kerangal, translated by Sam Taylor (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
- Eve Out of Her Ruins (Ève de Ses Décombres) by Ananda Devi, translated by Jeffrey Zuckerman (Deep Vellum Publishing)
- The Little Communist Who Never Smiled (La Petite Communiste qui ne souriait jamais) by Lola Lafon, translated by Nick Caistor (Seven Stories Press)
- Suite for Barbara Loden (Supplément à la vie de Barbara Loden) by Nathalie Léger, translated by Natasha Lehrer and Cécile Menon (Dorothy, a publishing project)
- Ladivine (Ludivine) by Marie NDiaye, translated by Jordan Stump (Knopf)
- Infidels (Infidèles) by Abdullah Taïa, translated by Alison L. Strayer (Seven Stories Press)
- Naked (Nue) by Jean-Philippe Toussaint, translated by Edward Gauvin (Dalkey Archive)
- Bardo or Not Bardo (Bardo or Not Bardo) by Antoine Volodine, translated by J. T. Mahany (Open Letter Books)
Congratulations to all the longlisted authors and translators. Ready, read, vote! and may the best book win!