Open half-day seminar on Ukrainian language and co-translation

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, there has been a great demand in Norway for Ukrainian language skills as well as knowledge about the country itself. One way of gaining insight into Ukraine’s history, culture and mentality is through fiction. Many Norwegian publishers want to publish fiction by Ukrainian authors, however there is currently a lack of qualified translators of Ukrainian to Norwegian.

NORLA and the Norwegian Association of Literary Translators will meet this demand by facilitating a collaboration between translators whose native languages are Norwegian and Ukrainian, i.e., between the Association of Literary Translators’ members and NORLA’s network of translators.

The project consists of three parts:

1. An open half-day seminar about Ukrainian language and literature, and co-translation. April 13, 2023, 9-13, at Litteraturhuset in Oslo.
The seminar will be live streamed here
More details available here (in Norwegian)

2. A Ukrainian-Norwegian translator’s workshop, June 24, 2023

3. A Ukraine issue of the periodical Mellom, which is devoted to the art of translation, containing the Ukrainian texts translated within the framework of the project, published in October 2023.
The first part of the project will therefore be the half-day seminar on April 13. There will be speakers from Norway and Ukraine. Some of the participants will take part via video link from Ukraine.
The project is initiated by the Norwegian Association of Literary Translators and NORLA, and is being carried out in close collaboration with Mellom and the Ukrainian Association in Norway.

Upcoming activities

November 22-November 24

Paris, France

Norwegian Literature at the Musée d’Orsay

On Friday, November 22, Margit Walsø and Andrine Pollen will introduce NORLA, along with Norwegian literature and the publishing industry, to Scandinavian Studies students at the Sorbonne University. Students will also meet authors Katrine Nedrejord and Lars Saabye Christensen, who will present themselves and their literary works. Katrine Nedrejord’s book The Sami Problem (original title: Sameproblemet ) will feature in a workshop on translation.

On Saturday, November 23, Marta Breen will deliver a lecture titled Women’s Place, followed by a discussion on ecology and minorities, between Kathrine Nedrejord and translator Marianne Ségol-Samoy, who has translated works by Nedrejord and also Jon Fosse into French.

Marianne Ségol-Samoy will also join a conversation with Gabriel Dufay, an actor, director, and Jon Fosse enthusiast, about the Nobel Prizes in Literature.

November 25

Meeting of NORLA’s expert committee for non-fiction

Meeting of NORLA’s expert committee for non-fiction, for the consideration of applications for translation subsidies with deadline 1 November.

November 26-December 4

Guadalajara, Mexico

NORLA and Norwegian participants to Mexico

From December 1-4, NORLA and the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Mexico will once again be present with a stand at the Guadalajara Book Fair in Mexico, which is the world’s largest Spanish-speaking book fair.