Anne Thompson Melo wins Peirene Stevns Translation Prize 2024
10 April 2024
Translator Anne Thompson Melo has been elected as the winner of the Pereine Stevns Translation Prize 2024. This year, the prize was aimed at emerging translators from Dutch to English. Anne Thompson Melo will receive a translation commission. The prize was supported by the Dutch Foundation for Literature, the Centre of Expertise for Literary Translation and Martha Stevns.
Contestants were invited to translate a sample of Zee nu by Eva Meijer (Uitgeverij Cossee, 2022), a thrilling novel about climate change and rising sea levels. Zee nu is going to be published in 2025 by Peirene Press (UK) and Two Lines Press (US). Anne Thompson Melo will receive a £5,200 commission to translate the full novel, a mentorship with International Booker Prize winning translator Michele Hutchison and a translation retreat in a 18th century mill house in the foothills of the French Pyrenees.
The Pereine Stevns Translation prize has been established in 2018, to provide opportunities for emerging translators over the age of 18, who have not yet published a full work of fiction in translation. The prize is part of Peirene Press, an independent publisher of new voices and stories from across the world.
The 2024 judges were Michele Hutchison, Haico Kaashoek and Paul Vincent. Apart from electing Anne Thompson Melo, the judges highly commended translators Michael Blass, Jake Goldwasser and Lucelle Pardoe.