Heather Cleary Wins the 2024 Queen Sofía Spanish Institute Translation Prize for Luis Felipe Fabre’s “Recital of the Dark Verses”
Adrian Nathan West Wins Runner-Up Prize for The Lost Steps by Alejo Carpentier
Heather Cleary won the 2024 Translation Prize, from the Queen Sofia Spanish Institute for her English translation of Recital of the Dark Verses by Luis Felipe Fabre, the seventh edition of the prize. Heather Cleary holds a PhD in Latin American and Iberian Cultures from Columbia University and teaches at Sarah Lawrence College. Her translations of prose and poetry have been recognized by the National Book Foundation, PEN America, and the Best Translated Book Award, among others. She has served on the jury of the National Book Award for Translation, the BTBA, and the PEN Translation Award. She accepted the award with great enthusiasm “It was truly one of the highlights of my career to bring the humor and heart of Luis Felipe Fabre’s brilliant Declaración de las canciones oscuras into English, and it means the world to me that three translators whose work I admire so deeply saw what I did with what Fabre did here and found it worthy of this prize. The very first seeds of this extraordinary little novel were planted years ago during Fabre’s graduate studies in Salamanca, so this recognition from the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute feels like a homecoming.”
During the ceremony, translator Charlotte Whittle, a member of the jury and winner of the Translation Prize in 2023, presented the finalists on the shortlist for the 2024 Translation Prize. In this edition, the jury decided to award a Runner-Up prize to the translator Adrian Nathan West for his translation of The Lost Steps by Alejo Carpentier.
Begonia Santos, Executive Director of the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute, announced the creation of a new Literary Translation Fellowship program to support emerging translators and thus encourage the publication of authors who write in Spanish in a wider American market. The program includes a publishers’ forum where translators can directly present their work to potential editors.
The ceremony was followed by a panel discussion with the participation of the winner, Heather Cleary, and John Siciliano, editor of the Runner-Up, along with Samantha Schnee and Amalia Gladhart. During the conversation, the participants discussed the winning texts and the current challenges in the field of translation.
Shortlist for the 2024 QSSI Translation Prize:
- “Cross-Stitch” by Jazmina Barrera, translated by Christina MacSweeney, published by Two Lines Press
- “Free Radicals” by Rosa Beltrán, translated by Robin Myers, published by Hablemos Escritoras / Katakana Editores
- “January” by Sarah Gallardo, translated by Frances Riddle and Maureen Shaughnessy, published by Archipelago Books
- “Recital of the Dark Verses” by Luis Felipe Fabre, translated by Heather Cleary, published by Deep Vellum
- “The Lost Steps” by Alejo Carpentier, translated by Adrian Nathan West, published by Penguin Classics
- “Tomás Nevinson” by Javier Marías, translated by Margaret Jull Costa, published by Alfred A. Knopf
About the Translation Prize:
With the goal of raising awareness and engendering appreciation for literature in Spanish in the United States, this $10,000 prize was created by the Cultural Committee and Board of Directors of the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute, recognizing the best translation into English of a literary work written in Spanish. Previously a triennial prize, it is now awarded annually. The Queen Sofía Spanish Institute Translation Prize Reading Committee is made up of a minimum of three experts with experience in Spanish and/or Latin American literature, translation, culture and/or language. This year’s Reading Committee was comprised of translation experts, including committee chair and founding editor and chair of the Words Without Borders organization’s board of trustees, Samantha Schnee; translator Charlotte Whittle, 2023 winner; and Amalia Gladhart, professor at the University of Oregon, 2022 winner.
About the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute:
The QSSI is a New York-based nonprofit corporation founded in 1954 by a group of American Hispanophiles who sought to stimulate American interest in the art, culture, customs, language, literature and history of Spain and the Spanish-speaking world. The QSSI keeps this vision current by striving to share the contributions of the Spanish-speakers to the history and culture of the United States and by showcasing the excellence of the Spanish-speaking world in numerous fields so that lasting ties of friendship may be formed, mutual understanding promoted, and bonds of peace strengthened.
