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Susan Bernofsky

スーザン・バーノフスキー

Susan Bernofsky

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1966-07-20 （Cleveland）
Nationality
United States
Languages
English, German (as source language)

Career

Occupations
translator, author, professor
Active Years
1996-
Affiliations
Columbia University
Influenced By
Robert Walser, Jenny Erpenbeck, Yoko Tawada, Christopher Middleton (translator)

Education

Washington University in St. Louis
MFA Program / Fiction
Degree: MFA
Country: United States
Princeton University
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences / Comparative Literature
Degree: PhD
Country: United States

Awards

Helen and Kurt Wolff Translation Prize
2006
Result: winner
Calw Hermann Hesse Prize
2012
Result: winner
Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize
2015
Work: Go, Went, Gone (translation)
Result: winner
Independent Foreign Fiction Prize
2015
Work: Go, Went, Gone (translation)
Result: winner
Schlegel-Tieck Prize
2015
Result: winner
Guggenheim Fellowship
2014
Organization: John S. Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Result: fellowship
Warwick Prize for Women in Translation
2017
Work: Memoirs of a Polar Bear (translation)
Result: winner
MLA Lois Roth Award
2018
Work: Go, Went, Gone (translation)
Organization: Modern Language Association (MLA)
Result: winner
National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography (finalist)
2021
Work: Clairvoyant of the Small: The Life of Robert Walser
Organization: National Book Critics Circle
Result: finalist

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Clairvoyant of the Small: The Life of Robert Walser

2021 Biography

A detailed biography of Swiss writer Robert Walser by Susan Bernofsky, reassessing his life, works, and significance in the history of translation and reception.

biographytranslation historyliterary reception

Go, Went, Gone (translation)

2017 Novel (translation)

Bernofsky's English translation of Jenny Erpenbeck's novel 'Go, Went, Gone', dealing with refugees, migration, and questions of identity in contemporary Europe.

migrationidentitysocial issues

Memoirs of a Polar Bear (translation)

2015 Novel (translation)

An English translation of Yoko Tawada's 'Memoirs of a Polar Bear', exploring boundaries between human and animal, memory, and identity.

memoryidentityhuman-animal boundary

Bibliography

  • Clairvoyant of the Small: The Life of Robert Walser (Yale University Press, 2021)
  • In Translation: Translators on Their Work and What It Means (co-edited with Esther Allen, Columbia University Press, 2013)
  • Translations of Robert Walser (multiple volumes)
  • English translations of Jenny Erpenbeck (including Go, Went, Gone)
  • English translations of Yoko Tawada (including Memoirs of a Polar Bear)
  • Translation of Kafka's The Metamorphosis (W.W. Norton, 2014)
  • Many other German-language translations (Paul Scheerbart, Jeremias Gotthelf, etc.)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
clear English that respects the rhythm and tone of the originalcareful rendering of literary nuance
Recurring Motifs
reassessment and revivalexploration of linguistic boundariesattention to detail

Legacy

Susan Bernofsky is a leading translator and scholar who brought Robert Walser to anglophone attention through translations and biography. She has produced numerous high-quality English translations of contemporary German-language literature and is highly regarded in the translation community.

Academic Societies

  • Modern Language Association (MLA)

Trivia

  • Teaches at Columbia University.
  • Has been instrumental in the revival of interest in Robert Walser and wrote his biography.
  • Awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2014.
  • Won the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation in 2017 for Memoirs of a Polar Bear.
  • Won the MLA Lois Roth Award in 2018 for translation of Go, Went, Gone.
  • Reportedly working on a translation of Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain as of 2024.