Tim Wilkinson (1947 –2020) was an English translator of Hungarian. He is best known for his translations of

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

laureate

Imre Kertész Imre Kertész (; 9 November 192931 March 2016) was a Hungarian author and recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Literature, "for writing that upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history". He was ...

and Miklós Szentkuthy.

Biography

After studying biochemistry at the

University of Liverpool The University of Liverpool (abbreviated UOL) is a Public university, public research university in Liverpool, England. Founded in 1881 as University College Liverpool, Victoria University (United Kingdom), Victoria University, it received Ro ...

, he moved to

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

in 1970 to work at the Central Institute of Physics. He arrived not knowing Hungarian and learnt the language “on the hoof” by living in Budapest with his Hungarian wife. Wilkinson worked in the pharmaceutical industry and only started literary translations in the late nineties after being horrified with the existing English translation of Kertész’s ''

Kaddish for an Unborn Child ''Kaddish for an Unborn Child'' () is a novel by Imre Kertész, first published in 1990 (). The novel deals with the struggles of a Holocaust survivor after the war, explaining to a friend why he cannot bring a child into a world that could allo ...

''. He was also concerned with the general lack of English translations of

Hungarian literature Hungarian literature is the body of written works primarily produced in Hungarian,

, noting that on average ten times more Hungarian titles are published annually in translation in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

than the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. Wilkinson also produced a new translation of

Fatelessness ''Fateless'' or ''Fatelessness'' (, ) is a novel by Imre Kertész, winner of the 2002 Nobel Prize for literature, written between 1960 and 1973 and first published in 1975. The novel is a semi-autobiographical story about a 14-year-old Hungarian ...

which won the PEN America translation prize in 2005 and the

Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize The Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize is an annual British literary prize inaugurated in 1977. It is named after the host ''Jewish Quarterly'' and the prize's founder Harold Hyam Wingate. The award recognises Jewish and non-Jewish writers ...

in 2006. The latter part of his professional life was dedicated to translating Miklós Szentkuthy.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilkinson, Tim 1947 births 2020 deaths Hungarian–English translators Alumni of the University of Liverpool