Indian translator Arunava Sinha is among PEN Translates 2017 grant winners

Indian translator Arunava Sinha’s translation of Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay’s Bengali book The Yogini is one of 16 books from across the world to win the 2017 PEN Translates grant. Sinha’s translated work will be published in 2019, according to the website.

Sinha is a consulting editor at Scroll.in.

The winners’ list, which was released on Wednesday, includes books from 15 countries and 14 languages. “We’re delighted to see publishers are becoming increasingly adventurous in their choices, and that, interestingly, a number of projects are translator-led,” said Ros Schwartz, the co-chair of the Writers in Translation committee. This underscores “the pro-active role translators can play in bringing books to publishers’ attention”, Schwartz added.

The award funds publishers in the United Kingdom and translators to meet costs of translating new work. PEN Translates funds up to 75% of translation costs for selected projects. The books selected for the grants are based on “outstanding literary quality, strength of the publishing project, and contribution to literary diversity in the UK”, the awards’ website said.

This years’ winners of the grant are:

The Yogini by Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay, translated from Bengali by Arunava Sinha

Butterfly Valley by Sherko Bekas, translated from Sorani (Iraqi Kurdish) by Choman Hardi

The Desert and the Drum by Mbarek Ould Beyrouk, translated from French by Rachael McGill;

The Eight Mountains by Paolo Cognetti, translated from Italian by Simon Carnell and Erica Segre;

The Chilli Bean Paste Clan by Yan Ge, translated from Chinese by Nicky Harman;

Men Don’t Cry by Faïza Guène, translated from French by Sarah Ardizzone;

L’ora de partir by Sèrgi Javaloyès, translated from Occitan by James Thomas;

A Place Upon Your Face by Sema Kaygusuz, translated from Turkish by Nicholas Glastonbury;

The Luminous Novel by Mario Levrero, translated from Spanish by Annie McDermott;

Negative Space by Luljeta Lleshanaku, translated from Albanian by Ani Gjika;

Home is Like a Different Time by Eva Moreda, translated from Galician by Craig Patterson;

States of Passion by Nihad Sirees, translated from Arabic by Max Weiss;

The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, translated from Polish by Jennifer Croft;

The Shape of the Ruins by Juan Gabriel Vásquez, translated from Spanish by Annie McLean;

The Polyglot Lovers by Lina Wolff, translated from Swedish by Saskia Vogel;

Moving Parts by Prabda Yoon, translated from Thai by Mui Poopoksakul.