Alfred Birnbaum (born 1955)Our Authors: Alfred Birnbaum
Hyperion Books. Accessed March 10, 2010. is an American translator. Alfred Birnbaum was born in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

and raised in

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

from age five. He studied at

Waseda University Waseda University (Japanese: ), abbreviated as or , is a private university, private research university in Shinjuku, Tokyo. Founded in 1882 as the Tōkyō Professional School by Ōkuma Shigenobu, the fifth Prime Minister of Japan, prime ministe ...

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

, under a

Japanese Ministry of Education The , also known as MEXT, is one of the eleven ministries of Japan that compose part of the executive branch of the government of Japan. History The Meiji government created the first Ministry of Education in 1871. In January 2001, the former ...

scholarship, and has been a freelance

literary Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, plays, and poems. It includes both print and digital writing. In recent centuries, ...

and

cultural Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

since 1980. From March 1977 to June 1979 Birnbaum, William Shurtleff, and Akiko Aoyagi did extensive field research and translation in Japan on natto, hamanatto and Daitokuji natto. This material was later published (in various formats) by Soyinfo Center, a research and publishing company in Lafayette,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. In the 1990s, while studying in

Yangon Yangon, formerly romanized as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar. Yangon was the List of capitals of Myanmar, capital of Myanmar until 2005 and served as such until 2006, when the State Peace and Dev ...

, he helped document architecture that was being replaced or destroyed. Birnbaum's translations include

Haruki Murakami is a Japanese writer. His novels, essays, and short stories have been best-sellers in Japan and internationally, with his work translated into 50 languages and having sold millions of copies outside Japan. He has received numerous awards for hi ...

's '' Hear the Wind Sing'', '' Pinball, 1973'', '' Norwegian Wood'', '' A Wild Sheep Chase'', '' Dance Dance Dance'', ''

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World is a 1985 novel by Japanese author Haruki Murakami. It was awarded the Tanizaki Prize in 1985. The English translation by Alfred Birnbaum was released in 1991. A new translation by Jay Rubin was released December 2024. A strange and dreamlike ...

'', '' Underground'', and other works;

Miyabe Miyuki is a Japanese writer of genre fiction. She has won numerous Japanese literary awards, including the Yoshikawa Eiji Prize for New Writers, the Yoshikawa Eiji Prize for Literature, the Shiba Ryotaro Prize, the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize, and the Naok ...

's ''

All She Was Worth ''All She Was Worth'' is a crime novel by Miyuki Miyabe. It was originally published under the Japanese title ''Kasha'' (Japanese: 火車). Plot introduction In 1992, Tokyo Metropolitan Police Detective Shunsuke Honma, on leave due to an incide ...

''; and Natsuki Ikezawa's ''A Burden of Flowers''. He also compiled the short story anthology ''Monkey Brain Sushi: New Tastes in Japanese Fiction''. With his wife Thi Thi Aye he translated ''Smile as they Bow'' by Nu Nu Yi from Burmese into English.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Birnbaum, Alfred 1955 births Japanese–English translators Living people American expatriates in Japan Waseda University alumni

See also

References