Susan Bernofsky (born 1966) is an American translator of German-language literature and author.

Life and work

Susan Bernofsky is best known for bringing the

Swiss Swiss most commonly refers to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Swiss may also refer to: Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss Café, an old café located ...

writer Robert Walser to the attention of the English-speaking world (in a "second wave" after the work of Christopher Middleton), translating many of his books and writing his biography. She has also translated several books by Jenny Erpenbeck and Yoko Tawada. She holds an MFA in Fiction from

Washington University Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) is a private research university in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1853 by a group of civic leaders and named for George Washington, the university spans 355 acres across its Danforth ...

and a PhD in Comparative Literature from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

. Her prizes for translation include the 2006 Helen and Kurt Wolff Translation Prize, the 2012 Calw Hermann Hesse Prize, the 2015 Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize, the 2015 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, and the 2015 Schlegel-Tieck Prize. She was also selected for a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...

in 2014. In 2017, she won the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation for her translation of ''Memoirs of a Polar Bear'' by Yoko Tawada. In 2018 she was awarded the MLA's Lois Roth Award for her translation of ''Go, Went, Gone'' by Jenny Erpenbeck. In 2024, Bernofsky was reported to be working on a translation of

Thomas Mann Paul Thomas Mann ( , ; ; 6 June 1875 – 12 August 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and the 1929 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate. His highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novell ...

's ''

The Magic Mountain ''The Magic Mountain'' (, ) is a novel by Thomas Mann. It was first published in Germany in November 1924. Since then, it has gone through numerous editions and been translated into many languages. It is widely considered a seminal work of 20t ...

''. She teaches at

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

. In April 2024, she was one of 23 Jewish professors at Columbia (including six

Barnard College Barnard College is a Private college, private Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college affiliated with Columbia University in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a grou ...

professors) to sign an open letter to Columbia president

Minouche Shafik Nemat Talaat Shafik, Baroness Shafik (born 13 August 1962), commonly known as Minouche Shafik, is a British-American academic and economist. She served as the president and vice chancellor of the London School of Economics from 2017 to 2023, a ...

, calling congressional investigations of antisemitism on university campuses "a new McCarthyism" intended "to rehearse and amplify decades-long bad-faith efforts to undermine universities as sites of learning, critical thinking, and knowledge production" and alleging a widespread effort to silence "Palestinian narratives and analyses on campus." The letter she signed declared that "today’s attacks on the university ecause of alleged climate hostile to Jewish and Israeli studentsare not truly about antisemitism." A shorter version of this letter was published in the

Columbia Daily Spectator The ''Columbia Daily Spectator'' (known colloquially as ''Spec'') is the student newspaper of Columbia University. Founded in 1877, it is the second-oldest continuously operating college news daily in the nation after '' The Harvard Crimson'', a ...

. In April 2024, she defended student protesters at Columbia University who were calling for an end to Israel’s war in Gaza and for divestment from companies supplying it with military-related products.

Books

* ''Clairvoyant of the Small: The Life of Robert Walser'' (Yale University Press, 2021) ** Finalist, National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography * '' In Translation: Translators on Their Work and What It Means'' (co-editor with Esther Allen, Columbia University Press, 2013)

Translations

Robert Walser

* ''Looking at Pictures'' * '' The Walk'' * ''Berlin Stories'' * '' The Assistant'' * ''Microscripts'' * '' The Tanners'' * '' The Robber'' * ''Masquerade and Other Stories''

Jenny Erpenbeck

* ''The Old Child and Other Stories'' * ''The Book of Words'' * ''Visitation'' * ''The End of Days'' * ''Go, Went, Gone''

Yoko Tawada

* ''Memoirs of a Polar Bear'' * ''The Naked Eye'' * ''Where Europe Begins'' *''Paul Celan and the Trans-Tibetan Angel'',

New Directions Publishing New Directions Publishing Corp. is an independent book publishing company that was founded in 1936 by James Laughlin (1914–1997) and incorporated in 1964. Its offices are located at 80 Eighth Avenue in New York City. History New Directions ...

, July 9, 2024,

Selected others

* ''

The Metamorphosis ''The Metamorphosis'' (), also translated as ''The Transformation'', is a novella by Franz Kafka published in 1915. One of Kafka's best-known works, ''The Metamorphosis'' tells the story of salesman Gregor Samsa, who wakes to find himself inex ...

'' (W.W. Norton & Company, 2014) by

Franz Kafka Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a novelist and writer from Prague who was Jewish, Austrian, and Czech and wrote in German. He is widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature. His work fuses elements of Litera ...

* ''Perpetual Motion'' by Paul Scheerbart * ''

The Magic Flute ''The Magic Flute'' (, ), K. 620, is an opera in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. It is a ''Singspiel'', a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue. The work premiered on ...

'' (

Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition and proficiency from an early age ...

opera libretto) by Emanuel Schikaneder commissioned by director Isaac Mizrahi for the Opera Theatre of St. LouisIsaac Mizrahi in conversation with Susan Bernofsky
and

Anne Bogart Anne Bogart (born September 25, 1951) is an American theatre and opera director. She is currently one of the artistic directors of SITI Company, which she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992. She is a professor at Columbia Uni ...

* '' The Black Spider'' (New York Review Books, 2013) by

Jeremias Gotthelf Albert Bitzius (4 October 179722 October 1854) was a Swiss novelist, best known by his pen name of Jeremias Gotthelf. Biography Bitzius was born at Murten, where his father was pastor. The Bitzius family had once belonged to the Bernese patric ...

* ''False Friends'' by Uljana Wolf * '' Siddhartha'' (Modern Library, 2006) by

Hermann Hesse Hermann Karl Hesse (; 2 July 1877 – 9 August 1962) was a Germans, German-Swiss people, Swiss poet and novelist, and the 1946 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate. His interest in Eastern philosophy, Eastern religious, spiritual, and philosophic ...

* ''Celan Studies'' by Peter Szondi * ''The Trip to Bordeaux'' by Ludwig Harig * ''Anecdotage: A Summation'' (Farrar Straus Giroux, 1996) by Gregor von Rezzori

References

External links

Translationista (Susan Bernofsky blog)

Professional website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bernofsky, Susan 1966 births Living people German–English translators American women non-fiction writers Literary translators 21st-century American women writers 20th-century American translators 21st-century American translators 21st-century American Jews Columbia University faculty