Francis Catalano
is awarded the John Glassco Prize for Literary Translation
for 2006


This year's John Glassco Prize, awarded by the Literary Translators' Association of Canada, goes to Francis Catalano for Instructions pour la lecture d'un journal, his French translation of Didascalie per la lettura di un giornale, by well-known Italian poet Valerio Magrelli. The translation was published in 2005 by Écrits des Forges

The judges also awarded an honourable mention to Joan Irving for Caribou Hunter: A Song of a Vanished Innu Life, published in 2006 by Greystone Books, an English translation of Récits de Mathieu Mestokosho, chasseur innu, by well-known anthropologist Serge Bouchard, published by Boréal in 2004.

The prize—which includes a cash payment of $1000—and the honourable mention were formally awarded on September 30, International Translation Day, during a literary evening held at Concordia University in Montréal.

The jury, which was made up of Jane Brierley, Robert Dickson and Charlotte Melançon, praised Francis Catalano's translation for its tone that perfectly reflects that of the original poems, and its conciseness, incisiveness and accuracy. They commented that the translator, himself a poet, had conveyed in French the delightful ironic terseness of the author's plays on words.

The jury described Joan Irving's translation as skillful and faithful, a rich and sober rendering of a fascinating narrative.

Both of the honoured works are wonderfully accessible, and each of them builds a bridge to a third culture, Italian in one case and Amerindian in the other, providing a masterful demonstration of the role of literary translation in society.

The John Glassco Prize, which was established in 1982, is awarded annually for a translator's first published book-length literary translation. The work may be translated from any language into either English or French and must be published in Canada. John Glassco, who gave his name to the prize, was a well-known writer and translator who died in 1981. Among his works are translations into English of the poetry and journals of Saint-Denys-Garneau.