Language forges bridges between cultures

 

Germany and Israel present first German-Hebrew Translation Prize in 2015.

 

Germany’s Minister for Culture, Monika Grütters, and her Israeli counterpart Miri Regev have presented the new Translation Prize in Berlin. Honored were Ruth Achlama for her translations from Hebrew of “A Viennese Romance“ by Dan Vogel and “Tashach“ by Yoram Kaniuk, as well as Nitza Ben Ari for her translation of Goethe‘s “Hermann and Dorothea“ and Yirmiyahu Yuval for his translation of Immanuel Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason“ by Immanuel Kant.

 

The new prize is a reflection of the great interest the two countries, both of which have such rich bodies of literature, show for each other. In Israel, not only are books by German-speaking authors highly popular, they moreover serve as a source of inspiration for some contemporary writers. This applies above all to the German-speaking authors of Classical Modernism – from Franz Kafka to Thomas Bernhard. In return, Israeli writers such as Amos Oz, David Grossman and Etgar Keret bring Israel’s complex history and society closer to German readers in their works.

“These interrelationships are not conceivable without translation,” writes the Literary Colloquium Berlin, which hosts the prize on the German side. “Literary translators contribute decisively to fostering a more sensitive and differentiated approach to the relationship between Germany and Israel.”

 

The prize will be presented biannually to two translators – one from each country – with Israel and in Germany taking turns as host countries. The award goes to outstanding achievements in translation; the winners will receive 10,000 euros each. Essays and ambitious non-fiction works will be considered in addition to the literary genres of poetry, novel and drama.

There are only a handful of literary translators who translate from Hebrew into German – according to the Directory of Translators issued by the Verband deutschsprachiger Übersetzer literarischer und wissenschaftlicher Werke (Association of German-speaking translators of literary and academic works) the figure is around a dozen. The directory lists some 900 translators, for all languages. Adding the word “Hebrew” into the search reduces the number to 12.  

 

Minister Grütters and her counterpart at the time, Limor Livnat, decided to launch the new German-Hebrew Translation Prize, a joint initiative by the German and Israeli governments, during the German-Israeli Government Consultations in February 2014.