National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists

On Saturday, the NBCC announced the finalists for the series of awards they hand out every year. As always, all of the finalists are pretty strong, and there are two works in translation up for prizes. Bolano’s 2666 is a fiction finalist, and Pierre Martory’s The Landscapist is a poetry finalist.

I must say, I’m not entirely sure why the official listing of the NBCC site references John Ashbery as the translator of the Martory, but doesn’t list Natasha Wimmer as the translator of 2666. Probably an oversight, and not the only place where translator’s names tend to disappear (try looking through a publisher’s catalog some time and guessing whether certain books are translated or not), but still . . .

I was half-watching the live blog of this event, and liked Monica de la Torre’s comment that it was nice that 2666 was honored,

but had hoped that other books in translation would have received more attention in this year’s awards season as well. “There’s just so much out there!“ she exclaimed.

It’s also really cool that the PEN America Center is receiving the NBCC’s Ivan Sandrof Life Achievement Award. Very cool and very deserving.