John Hargraves, Recipient of the 2009 Helen and Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize
Members of the jury were:
- Renate Latimer (Atlanta, GA)
- Krishna Winston (Middletown, CT)
- Peter Constantine (New York)
- Denis Scheck (Köln, Deutschland)
- and Committee Chair, Rainer Schulte (Dallas, TX).
The jury said that “John Hargraves has performed a masterful job in recreating the authentic and natural voice of Michael Krüger’s novel The Executor (Die Turiner Komödie). The language is vigorous and full of penetrating humor. Hargraves displays a sensibility that fully understands the subtle undertones of the German language, for which he then finds elegant and refined stylistic correspondences in the English language. Nothing seems to be lost in this translation, vibrates with a refreshing vitality. “
John Hargraves is an author, translator, and editor. He has written Music in the Works of Broch, Mann and Kafka (Camden House, 2001) and has translated Elias Canetti’s Notes from Hampstead (Farrar, Straus, Giroux 1998), Dear Mrs. Strigl, a memoir of Hermann Broch by his son H.F.Broch de Rothermann (Yale University 2001) , Geist and Zeitgeist: The Spirit in an Unspiritual Age (Counterpoint Press, 2003), a collection of essays by Hermann Broch, with an introduction by the translator, various essays on Philip Roth, Bach: Life and Work by Martin Geck (Harcourt, Inc. 2006) and The Executor: A Comedy of Letters by Michael Krüger (Harcourt, Inc. 2008). In addition, he has edited many of the German translations of the novels of Philip Roth for Hanser in Munich. He received a B.A. from Dartmouth and a Ph.D. from Yale. He has taught German at Yale and Connecticut College. He is also a pianist and accompanist with an interest in song.
The honor will be presented to him on June 8, 2009 at 6:00 p.m. at the Chicago Cultural Center, 5th Floor, Millennium Room, 78 E. Washington, Chicago, IL 60601.
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