Imogen Taylor

Imogen Taylor is a British literary translator. She translates works from German to English, and has previously won the Goethe-Institut Prize for her work. Her notable translations include Sasha Marianna Salzmann's novel, Beside Myself, Melanie Raabe's The Trap, as well as Florian Huber's Promise Me You’ll Shoot Yourself: The Downfall of Ordinary Germans, 1945; and Sascha Arango's novel, The Truth and Other Lies. Her work has been shortlisted for the Schlegel-Tieck Prize and Helen and Kurt Wolff's Translator Prize.

Biography

Taylor completed her undergraduate education at New College, Oxford where she studied French and German. She completed her doctorate at the Humboldt University, in Berlin, where she studied bilingual couples in 18th century French novels.^[1] She has lived in Berlin since 2001.^[2]

Career

In 2015, Taylor published a translation of Sascha Arango's novel, The Truth and Other Lies (Die Wahrheit und andere Lügen). Her translation was listed as The New York Times' 100 Notable Books of 2015.^[3] In 2016, Taylor won the Goethe-Institut award for an excerpt of her translation Momente der Klarheit by Jackie Thomae (Hanser Berlin).^[4] In the same year, the Seattle Times's critic Adam Woog listed her translation of Melanie Raabe's The Trap as one of the 10 best mysteries of the year.^[5]

In 2018, The Guardian praised her "sure-footed" translation of Fear by Dirk Kurbjuweit (Orion)^[6] and listed it as one of the best books of 2018.^[7] The translation also earned praise from the Irish Times^[8] and Toronto Star.^[9]

In 2019, she published an English translation of German author and historian Florian Huber's best-selling account of mass suicides in Germany towards the end of World War II, titled Promise Me You’ll Shoot Yourself: The Downfall of Ordinary Germans, 1945.^[10][11] Taylor earned praise from the Financial Times, with reviewer Ruta Sepetys praising her "vivid translation",^[12] as well as from the Telegraph, which reviewed her "fine translation.".^[13]

In 2021, Taylor translated Sasha Marianna Salzmann's novel, Beside Myself, from German to English. The translation was received well, and was shortlisted for two major German-English translation awards: the Schlegel-Tieck Prize and the Helen and Kurt Wolff's Translator Prize.^[1]

Awards

• 2016: Winner, Goethe-Institut Award for a translation of an extract from Momente der Klarheit by Jackie Thomae (Hanser Berlin)^[4]
• 2020: Shortlisted, Schlegel-Tieck Prize for a translation of Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself^[1]
• 2021: Shortlisted, Helen and Kurt Wolff's Translator Prize for a translation of Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself^[1]
• 2021: Longlisted, Dublin Literary Award 2020, for a translation of Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself^[2]

Bibliography

Translations from German to English:

• (2015) Sascha Arango, The truth and other lies (Melbourne : Text Publishing Company; Scoresby : Penguin Group Australia) ISBN 9-781-92218-2777
• (2016) Anja Reich-Osang, The Scholl case : the deadly end of a marriage (Melbourne, Vic. : Text Publishing) ISBN 9-781-92524-0931
• (2017) Dirk Kurbjuweit, Fear (Harper, New York) ISBN 9-780-06267-8348
• (2017) Melanie Raabe, The Trap (Melbourne, Victoria : Text Publishing Company) ISBN 9-781-92549-8042
• (2019) Melanie Raabe, The Shadow (Melbourne, Vic. : Text Publishing) ISBN 9-781-92226-8617
• (2019) Sasha Marianna Salzmann, Beside Myself (New York : Other Press) ISBN 9-781-89274-6443
• (2020) Florian Huber, Promise Me You’ll Shoot Yourself: The Downfall of Ordinary Germans, 1945 (Little, Brown Spark, New York) ISBN 9-780-31653-4307
• (2021) Dirk Kurbjuweit, The missing (Melbourne, Victoria : The Text Publishing Company) ISBN 9-781-92233-0444

References

1. "Imogen Taylor - Writes @ Berlin". www.literaturport.de. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
2. "Beside Myself – DUBLIN Literary Award". Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
3. "100 Notable Books of 2015". The New York Times. 27 November 2015. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
4. "Oxford Alumna wins top award for new translators | Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages". www.mod-langs.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
5. "Adam Woog's 10 best mysteries of 2016". The Seattle Times. 8 December 2016. Archived from the original on 9 December 2016. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
6. "Consent by Leo Benedictus and Fear by Dirk Kurbjuweit – review". the Guardian. 21 January 2018. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
7. "Guardian best books of 2018: across fiction, politics, food and more". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
8. "Fear by Dirk Kurbjuweit review: a gripping tale of domestic terror". The Irish Times. Archived from the original on 3 February 2018. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
9. Batten, Jack (29 December 2017). "Whodunit: mini reviews of mysteries". The Toronto Star. ISSN 0319-0781. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
10. "'Promise me You'll Shoot Yourself': Nazi Germany's Suicide Wave". The Wire. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
11. "Why a Wave of Suicides Washed Over Germany After the Nazi Defeat". Haaretz. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
12. Sepetys, Ruta (16 August 2019). "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself — a German requiem". Financial Times. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
13. Rees, Laurence (29 June 2019). "'The thought of living on is unbearable': the story behind the German mass suicides of 1945". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Archived from the original on 11 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2022.