Alex Zucker Receives National Endowment for the Arts
Washington, DC — Rocco Landesman, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, today announced that Alex Zucker has been recommended for an NEA Literature Translation Fellowship of $12,500. Zucker is one of 16 to receive an NEA fiscal year 2012 Literature Translation Fellowship. In total, the NEA will distribute $200,000 to support the translation of works into English.
Alex Zucker's first visit to Czechoslovakia was in 1987. He was inspired to translate by Peter Kussi, his Czech instructor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, where in 1990 he received a master's degree. From 1990 to 1995 he lived in Prague. City Sister Silver, his translation of Jáchym Topol's first novel, was selected for the guide 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. All This Belongs to Me, his translation of Petra Hůlová's first novel, received the National Translation Award from the American Literary Translators Association. Said Zucker: "F. X. Šalda said the feeling he had reading the book in 1931 was akin to catching a buzz. My aim, in translating it, is for readers today to feel the same."
Markéta Lazarová was a bestseller when it appeared in 1931. But it was not Vančura's first. The surgeon-turned-writer had five novels under his belt by then, including two bestsellers: Baker Jan Marhoul (1924) and Summer of Caprice (1925). He was also founding chairman of the Czech avant-garde art association Devětsil, a film director, a playwright, and from 1921 to 1929 a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia.
In 1939, after Hitler occupied the Czech lands of Bohemia and Moravia, Vančura, although no longer a Party member, joined an underground Communist resistance group. On May 12, 1942, the Gestapo arrested him and tortured him at their headquarters in Prague. On May 27, two members of the Czechoslovak army in exile, parachuted in from Britain, assassinated Reinhard Heydrich, the local Nazi ruler (Reichsprotektor). In retaliation, the Nazis executed over 2,000 members of the Czech elite, including, on June 1, Vančura.
As a writer, Vančura was best known for his expressive amalgam of archaic speech and popular idioms. Three of his novels have been made into films, and the cinematic adaptation of Markéta Lazarová, by director František Vláčil in 1967, is viewed by many as the greatest Czech film of all time.
The only English translations of Vančura's writings are the now out-of-print The End of the Old Times (Prague: Artia, 1965, trans. Edith Pargeter) and the recent Summer of Caprice (Prague: Karolinum Press, 2006, trans. Mark Corner). Markéta Lazarováhas been translated into Spanish, German, French, Polish, Russian, and Croatian, but never into English.
NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman said, “Translation not only brings great literature to wider audiences, but it also creates a broader awareness of cultures. Through these 16 fellowships, the NEA is bringing knowledge of cultures around the world, from both the past and present, to American audiences.”
Since the inception of the literary translation program in 1981, the Arts Endowment has awarded 339 Translation Fellowships in 62 languages from 72 countries. This year saw the largest number of applications—105—received for the fellowships.
For the complete list of FY 2012 NEA Literature Translation Fellows, visit http://www.arts.gov/news/news11/Translation-fellowships.html.
The National Endowment for the Arts was established by Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. To date, the NEA has awarded more than $4 billion to support artistic excellence, creativity, and innovation for the benefit of individuals and communities. The NEA extends its work through partnerships with state arts agencies, local leaders, other federal agencies, and the philanthropic sector. To join the discussion on how art works, visit the NEA at www.arts.gov.
