Join us as we count down to ALTA42: Sight and Sound with the National Translation Award in Poetry and Prose long- and shortlisted titles! We will be featuring the titles in alphabetical order alongside blurbs penned by our judges for the National Translation Awards in Poetry and Prose. This year’s prose judges are Bonnie Huie, Charlotte Mandell, and Jeffrey Zuckerman. This year’s judges for poetry are Anna Deeny Morales, Cole Heinowitz, and Sholeh Wolpe.

For quick reference, you may find the NTA longlists here, and the NTA shortlists here. Today we’re shining the spotlight on Prose NTA shortlisted title The Naked Woman:

The Naked Woman
by Armonía Somers
translated from the Spanish by Kit Maude
(The Feminist Press)

Infused with a timeless, utopian quality, Kit Maude’s translation of this Uruguayan feminist-surrealist gem brings to life a work that is almost manifesto-like in its politically charged imagery. The book rewrites the story of Adam and Eve, whose interpretation underpins the oppression of women through the control of their sexuality, through a re-envisioned female archetype who seeks to overturn the judgment cast upon her kind. It’s easy to imagine how this book, laden with double meanings and hints of conspiratorial whispers among women, can still provoke and upset readers almost 70 years after its initial publication.