Winner

The 2010 PEN Translation Prize went to to Michael Henry Heim for his translation from the Dutch of Wonder by Hugo Claus.

The PEN Translation Prize is awarded to book-length translations from any language into English. The prize has been supported since 1963 in recognition of the art of the literary translator—the first American award to do so. The most recent recipients are: Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky for their translation of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, R. W. Flint’s translation of The Moon and the Bonfiresby Cesare Pavese, Margaret Sayers Peden’s translation of Sepharad by Antonio Muñoz Molina, Philip Gabriel for his translation of Haruki Murakami’s Kafka on the Shore, and Sandra Smith for her translation of Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky.

2010 Judges 

Peter Constantine, Marjolijn de Jager, Alyson Waters

From the Judges’ Citation

“Michael Henry Heim’s outstanding translation has succeeded masterfully in mirroring Hugo Claus’s many voices in this novel that reflects a complex, complicated vision of post-World War II Flanders. It is a world that Claus describes in language that is often deeply poetic, and that alternates between simplicity and hyperbole, clarity and obfuscation, fantasy and reality. To capture all of this in English requires an intensely focused mind as well as an acutely sensitive ear. Michael Henry Heim proves to have both.”

2010 Finalists

Esther Allen for her translation from the Spanish of Rex by Jose Manuel Prieto

David Constantine for his translation from the German of Faust by Goethe