The Found in Translation award was founded by the Book Institute, the Polish Cultural Institute in London, and the Polish Cultural Institute in New York, and is presented annually to a translator of Polish literature to English. The jury, Antonia Lloyd-Jones and Philip Boehm (awarded in the previous editions) and Anna Godlewska, Bartek Remisko and Grzegorz Gauden (the organizers’ representatives), awarded Choucas, one of Zofia Nałkowska’s least known novels. The book was published in Poland in 1927 and is set in a health resort in the Swiss Alps. The eponymous birds, an Alpine species of a jackdaw, keep its visitors of various nationalities company. The novel attempts to examine the psychological basis for nationalism.
Ursula Philips is known for her fondness for women’s writing of the 19th and early 20th century. She researches and popularizes Polish literature at the School of Slavonic & East European Studies of the University College in London. So far, her translations include for Narcyza Żmichowska’s The Heathen, Maria Wirtemberska’s Malvina, or The Heart's Intuition, and Wiesław Myśliwski’s The Palace, as well as several books by Agnieszka Taborska and works on the theory of literature. Philips is also an author and co-author of numerous essay books, including the 2013 Polish Literature in Transformation.
The English edition of Zofia Nałkowska’s Choucas was published in 2014 by Northern Illinois University. The author of the winning translation was awarded 10,000 złotys and a three-month artistic residence in Kraków.
Source: Book Institute, edit. AW
Translated by Paweł Trzaskowski, July 2015