Posts

2025 Governor General’s Literary Award Finalists: BALDWIN, STYRON, AND ME and MAY OUR JOY ENDURE

/in /by

We’re excited to share that this morning on Tuesday, October 21, two Biblioasis books were announced as finalists for the 2025 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation: Catherine Khordoc’s translation of Baldwin, Styron, and Me by Mélikah Abdelmoumen and Donald Winkler’s translation of May Our Joy Endure by Kev Lambert!

View the full finalists announcement on the GG Books website here.

The Canada Council for the Arts funds, administers and actively promotes the Governor General’s Literary Awards (GGBooks) which celebrate literature and inspire people to read books by creators from Canada. The award provides finalists and winners with valuable recognition from peers and readers across the country. The monetary award for finalists is $1,000, and $25,000 for each winning book.

The winners of each category will be announced on Thursday, November 6.

About BALDWIN, STYRON, AND ME

Finalist for the 2025 Governor General’s Literary Award in Translation • Finalist for the 2025 John Glassco Translation Prize

In 1961, James Baldwin spent several months in William Styron’s guest house. The two wrote during the day, then spent evenings confiding in each other and talking about race in America. During one of those conversations, Baldwin is said to have convinced his friend to write, in first person, the story of the 1831 slave rebellion led by Nat Turner. The Confessions of Nat Turner was published to critical acclaim, winning the Pulitzer Prize in 1968, and also creating outrage in part of the African American community.

Decades later, the controversy around cultural appropriation, identity, and the rights and responsibilities of the writer still resonates. In Baldwin, Styron, and Me, Mélikah Abdelmoumen considers the writers’ surprising yet vital friendship from her standpoint as a racialized woman torn by the often unidimensional versions of her identity put forth by today’s politics and media. Considering questions of identity, race, equity, and the often contentious public debates about these topics, Abdelmoumen works to create a space where the answers are found by first learning how to listen—even in disagreement.

Catherine Khordoc is a professor of French and Canadian Studies at Carleton University in Ottawa. She is the author of Tours et détours: Le mythe de Babel dans la littérature contemporaine (University of Ottawa Press, 2012). She also considers herself in many ways a frontier-dweller.

Grab a copy of Baldwin, Styron, and Me here!

About MAY OUR JOY ENDURE

Finalist for the 2025 Governor General’s Literary Award in Translation • A Walrus Best Book of Fall 2024 • A Globe 100 Best Book of 2024 • Winner of the 2023 Prix Médicis, Prix Décembre, and Prix Ringuet

Céline Wachowski, internationally renowned architect and accidental digital-culture icon, unveils her plans for the Webuy Complex, her first megaproject in Montreal, her hometown. But instead of the triumph she anticipates in finally bringing her reputation to bear in her own city, the project is excoriated by critics, who accuse her of callously destroying the social fabric of neighborhoods, ushering in a new era of gentrification, and many even deadlier sins. When she is deposed as CEO of her firm, Céline must make sense of the charges against herself and the people in her elite circle. For the first time in danger of losing their footing, what fictions must they tell themselves to justify their privilege and maintain their position in the world that they themselves have built?

Moving fluidly between Céline’s perspective and the perspectives of her critics, and revealing both the ruthlessness of her methods and the brilliance of her aesthetic vision, May Our Joy Endure is a shrewd examination of the microcosm of the ultra-privileged and a dazzling social novel that depicts with razor-sharp acuity the terrible beauty of wealth, influence, and art.

Donald Winkler is a translator of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. He is a three-time winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for French-to-English translation. He lives in Montreal.

Grab a copy of May Our Joy Endure here!

THE HOLLOW BEAST a finalist for the 2024 GOVERNOR GENERAL’S AWARD IN TRANSLATION!

/in /by

We are thrilled to share that this morning, The Hollow Beast by Christophe Bernard, translated by Lazer Lederhendler, was listed as a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation! You can check out the official finalists announcement here.

The winning books will be announced on November 13, 2024. 

Montreal-based Lazer Lederhendler is no stranger to this honour, having previously won the Governor General’s Award for French to English translation three times, including for two other Biblioasis books, The Party Wall by Catherine Leroux and If You Hear Me by Pascale Quiviger. The Hollow Beast marks his eleventh nomination overall.

Lazer commented on his nomination:

“It’s always gratifying to know that one’s work as a translator is appreciated by readers, particularly when those readers make up the peer assessment committee for this year’s GG translation award. I feel especially honoured to be part of such a remarkable group of finalists.”

“We’re very pleased that Lazer was recognized for his work translating this beast of a novel,” Biblioasis publisher Dan Wells said. “More than 150,000 words, complete with rural dialects, regional word-play, and as crazy a plot as has appeared in the past calendar year, Lazer’s work translating The Hollow Beast confirms as much as his three previous GG Awards for translation (and eight additional nominations!) that he has long been one of the pre-eminent translators in the country. This was heroic work, and I’m glad his jury of fellow translators gave Lazer an additional nod.”

The Canada Council for the Arts funds, administers and actively promotes the Governor General’s Literary Awards (GGBooks) which celebrate literature and inspire people to read books by creators from Canada. The award provides finalists and winners with valuable recognition from peers and readers across the country. The monetary award for finalists is $1,000, and $25,000 for each winning book.

Congratulations to Lazer and The Hollow Beast from all of us at Biblioasis!

Grab a copy of The Hollow Beast here!

ABOUT THE HOLLOW BEAST

Don Quixote meets Who Framed Roger Rabbit in this slapstick epic about destiny, family demons, and revenge.

Credit: Monique Dykstra

1911. A hockey game in Quebec’s Gaspé Peninsula. With the score tied two-two in overtime, local tough guy Billy Joe Pictou fires the puck directly into Monti Bouge’s mouth. When Pictou’s momentum carries them both across the goal line in a spray of shattered teeth, Victor Bradley, erstwhile referee and local mailman, rules that the goal counts—and Monti’s ensuing revenge for this injustice sprawls across three generations, one hundred years, and dozens of dastardly deeds. Fuelled by a bottomless supply of Yukon, the high-proof hooch that may or may not cause the hallucinatory sightings of a technicolor beast that haunts not just Monti but his descendants, it’s up to Monti’s grandson François—and his floundering doctoral dissertation—to make sense of the vendetta that’s shaped the destiny of their town and everyone in it. Brilliantly translated into slapstick English by Lazer Lederhendler, The Hollow Beast introduces Christophe Bernard as a master of epic comedy.

ABOUT LAZER LEDERHENDLER

Lazer Lederhendler is a full-time literary translator specializing in Québécois fiction and non-fiction. His translations have earned awards and distinctions in Canada, the UK, and the US. He has translated the works of noted authors, including Gaétan Soucy, Nicolas Dickner, Edem Awumey, Perrine Leblanc, and Catherine Leroux. He lives in Montreal with the visual artist Pierrette Bouchard.

IF YOU HEAR ME wins the 2020 GOVERNOR GENERAL’S LITERARY AWARD IN TRANSLATION

/in /by

Biblioasis is thrilled to share that this morning on Tuesday, June 1, 2021, it was announced by the Canada Council for the Arts that If You Hear Me by Pascale Quiviger & translated by Lazer Lederhendler (March 3, 2020) has won the 2020 Governor General’s Literary Award in Translation! As the winning translator, Lazer Lederhendler is awarded $25,000 CAD. All finalists received $1,000 CAD. This is Lazer Lederhendler’s third time winning the Governor General’s Literary Award in Translation. He previously won for The Party Wall in 2016 (Biblioasis) and Nikolski in 2008 (Knopf Canada).

In a statement, publisher Dan Wells said, “All of us at Biblioasis are very happy that Lazer Lederhendler’s translation of Pascale Quiviger’s If You Hear Me has won the Governor General’s Award for Translation. Lazer has long been one of the very best translators in the country, as this, his sixth nomination and third win for the Governor General’s Award attest: it’s been an honour and joy to work with him on If You Hear Me, and we thank the jury for their support and acknowledgement of his incredible work.”

If You Hear Me was chosen as the winner by a peer assessment committee that included Angela Carr, Jo-Anne Elder, and Nigel Spencer. Here’s what they had to say in praise of the book:

“Lazer Lederhendler has presented challenging subject matter with sensitivity, nuance and elegance. His language is powerful yet limpid, understated yet heartbreaking, and lightly humorous. He delicately navigates complex layers of trauma in the immigrant and the patient, lingering between life and death, dream and reality. The finely drawn characters in this novel wait, as we all do, for release.”

The awards, administered by the Canada Council for the Arts, are given in seven English-language categories: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, young people’s literature—text, young people’s literature—illustration, drama and translation. Seven French-language awards are also given out in the same categories.

The other finalists for the Governor General’s Literary Award in Translation were Amaryllis & Little Witch by Pascal Brullemans & translated by Alexis Diamond (Playwrights Canada Press), Back Roads by Andrée A. Michaud & translated by J. C. Sutcliffe (House of Anansi), The Country Will Bring Us No Peace by Matthieu Simard & translated by Pablo Strauss (Coach House Books), and The Neptune Room by Bertrand Laverdure & translated by Oana Avasilichioaei (Book*hug Press).

To celebrate the win, Biblioasis is hosting a virtual event on Saturday, June 26, 2021 at 2 PM EDT with both Pascale Quiviger and Lazer Lederhendler. There will be a discussion, a Q&A, and a book giveaway! Stay tuned for more details.

ABOUT IF YOU HEAR ME

Sliding doors open and close automatically, exit to the left, entrance to the right. Beyond it, cars go by, and pedestrians and cyclists. A large park behaves as if nothing has happened. The mirage of a world intact.

In an instant, a life can change forever. After he falls from a scaffold on the construction site where he works, David, deep in a coma, is visited regularly by his wife, Caroline, and their six-year-old son Bertrand. Yet despite their devotion, there seems to be no crossing the divide between consciousness and the mysterious world David now inhabits. Devastated by loss and the reality that their own lives must go on, the mourners face difficult questions. How do we communicate when language fails? When, and how, do we move forward? What constitutes a life, and can there be such a thing as a good death? All the while, David’s inner world unfolds, shifting from sensory perceptions, to memories of loved ones, to nightmare landscapes from his family’s past in WWII Poland.

Elegantly translated by Lazer Lederhendler, If You Hear Me is a gripping account of a woman’s struggle to let go of the husband whose mind is lost to her while his body lives on in the bittersweet present, and a deft rendering of the complexity of grief, asking what it means to be alive and how we learn to accept the unacceptable—while at the same time bearing witness to the enduring power of hope, and the ways we find peace in unexpected places.

ABOUT PASCALE QUIVIGER

Born in Montreal, Pascale Quiviger studied visual arts, earned an M.A. in philosophy and did an apprenticeship in print-making in Rome. She has published four novels, a book of short stories and a book of poems, and has written and illustrated two art books. Her novel The Perfect Circle won the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction in French, and, in English translation, was a finalist for the Giller Prize. The Breakwater House was a finalist for the Prix France-Québec, and If You Hear Me was translated into Spanish. A resident of Italy for more than a decade, Pascale Quiviger now lives with her family in Nottingham, England.

ABOUT LAZER LEDERHENDLER

Lazer Lederhendler is a full-time literary translator specializing in Québécois fiction and non-fiction. His translations have earned awards and distinctions in Canada, the U.K., and the U.S.A. He has translated the works of noted authors including Gaétan Soucy, Nicolas Dickner, Edem Awumey, Perrine Leblanc, and Catherine Leroux. He lives in Montreal with the visual artist Pierrette Bouchard.

 

Get your copy of If You Hear Me now from Biblioasis!