Join us as we count down to the ALTA43: In Between awards ceremony with the National Translation Award in Poetry and Prose longlisted 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 judges for prose are Amaia Gabantxo, Emmanuel D. Harris II, and William Maynard Hutchins. This year’s judges for poetry are Ilya Kaminsky, Lisa Katz, and Farid Matuk.

The awards ceremony will air on October 15, 2020 on ALTA’s Crowdcast page: you can register to attend the NTA in Prose announcement here, and the NTA in Poetry announcement here. Find the full list of longlisted titles here.

Today we’re shining the spotlight on NTA in Prose long- and shortlisted title Zuleikha:

Zuleikha
by Guzel Yakhina
translated from Russian by Lisa C. Hayden
(Oneworld)

A village road smoothly curves and flows off toward the horizon, like a river. Windows are already lighting in some houses. Quickly, Zuleika.

The harsh and desolate land of Soviet-era Siberia forms the backdrop of Yakhina’s first novel, an ambitious narrative capturing the strength of the human spirit. Zuleika discovers the means to survive an abusive husband and cruel mother-in-law in a story wrought with imagery and discovery. Hayden’s powerful, yet sensitive, translation incorporates songs and legends from Russian and Tatar sayings into a seamlessly captivating epic tale. What at first glance appears geographically distant becomes intimate, relatable, and in many ways triumphant.