• Marian Schwartz is a prize-winning translator of Russian fiction, history, biography, criticism, and fine art. She is the principal English translator of the works of Nina Berberova and translated the New York Times bestseller The Last Tsar, by Edvard Radzinsky, as well as classics by Mikhail Bulgakov, Ivan Goncharov, Yuri Olesha, and Mikhail Lermontov. Her two most recent book translations are Mikhail Bulgakov's White Guard (Yale University Press) and Ivan Goncharov’s Oblomov (Seven Stories Press), soon to be out in paperback from Yale University Press. Overlook Press will publish her translation of Olga Slavnikova's 2017 in March 2010. She is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts translation fellowships and is a past president of the American Literary Translators Association.

Mining the Human Landscape in Slavnikova’s 2017

image thumb3 Mining the Human Landscape in Slavnikova’s 2017 Lizok’s Bookshelf has run the first review I’ve seen of my translation of Olga Slavnikova’s forthcoming novel, 2017, which Overlook Press is publishing in March:

Olga Slavnikova’s Booker-winning 2017 is so tough to describe that I think I’ll do something very lazy and begin with words that compactly list some of its themes: rock hound, translucence, rubies, Looking Glass (beyond), death, carnival, existentialism, false, genuine, mountain spirits, nature, reality, emptiness, illegal, companionship, revolution, secrets, Bazhov… more

Posted in news, publications, reviews | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Praise for Yuzefovich’s Latest

Lisa Hayden Espenschade of Lizok's Bookshelf:  Reading Ideas from Classic and Contemporary Russian Fiction raves about Leonid Yuzefovich’s Cranes and Pygmies, which won the 2009 Big Book award—and which she read in the original Russian.  As a bonus, she recommends his story, “The Storm,” which appeared in my translation in Life Stories, a collection from Russian Information Services.

Posted in news, publications | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Making the Translator Visible: Marian Schwartz

image thumb2 Making the Translator Visible: Marian Schwartz Chad Post, editor extraordinaire of Open Letter Books, a relatively new publisher devoted exclusively to international literature, featured me today on this new feature of his Three Percent blog.  Read all about it here.

Posted in news, works in progress | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

White Guard Wins AATSEEL Prize

I’m thrilled to announce that my translation of Mikhail Bulgakov’s White Guard has won the 2009 AATSEEL Award for Best Translation into English.  The American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages (AATSEEL), founded in 1941, “exists to advance the study and promote the teaching of Slavic and East European languages, literatures, and cultures on all educational levels, elementary through graduate school,”  and the AATSEEL seal of approval ensures that this translation will be used in classrooms for many years to come. 

Kudos to Yale University Press and its then senior editor Jonathan Brent for conceiving of the project and producing such a fine edition, with a serious and essential introductory essay by Professor Evgeny Dobrenko of the University of Sheffield in the UK.

Posted in news, publications | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Yale UP’s Modern Take on Oblomov

image thumb1 Yale UP’s Modern Take on Oblomov Here is Yale University Press’s sleek modern cover for its paperback edition of my translation of Oblomov, scheduled for publication in February 2010.  Incredibly handsome, I think.  I wonder whether Oblomov ever slept barefoot.  Or under satin sheets, for that matter. 

For more about the book, or to pre-order (you know you want to), click here.

Posted in publications | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Slate Picks Oblomov

oblomovcover thumb Slate Picks OblomovThe translator is always the last to know.  Slate chose my Oblomov translation as one of its Best Books of 2008!  Read about it here.  And be looking for the paperback edition, coming in February from Yale University Press.

Posted in news, publications, reviews | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment