Der neue Bereich unseres Portals macht es sich zum Anliegen, die internationalen Literaturszenen Berlins zu kartographieren, die handelnden Personen und ihre Schauplätze sichtbar und zugänglich zu machen. 
Die Entstehung der Rubrik wurde durch eine Förderung des Hauptstadtkulturfonds ermöglicht. 

Imogen Taylor

Translator

Imogen Taylor

Profile

Born: 1978
Birthplace: London
Country of birth: UK
Lives in: Berlin, Friedrichshain


Source language: German/French
Target language: English

Vita

Imogen Taylor studied French and German at New College, Oxford and at the Humboldt University, Berlin where she wrote a PhD thesis on bilingual couples in the eighteenth-century French novel. She has been working as a literary translator since 2014.

6 Questions

What brought you to Berlin? Love? World politics? Or was it a coincidence?

Escapism.


What do you love about Berlin?

Nightingales singing on four-lane roads.


What do you miss in Berlin?

Hills.


What is your favorite spot in Berlin?

The corner of Kollwitzstraße and Belforter Straße. Not because of its current gentrified state, but because I like to remember that I once saw camels there, when there were still bits of wasteland in Prenzlauer Berg.


Would you say you are a different person in Berlin? A different translator? And if yes, in what way?

I think I'm essentially the same person I was as a four-year-old in London, so no. But it's nice to be a translator somewhere where there are so many other translators; translating is probably a lot less lonely in Berlin than elsewhere.


Which existing literary work do you wish you had written?

You can't write other people's books - or is that what translators do?

Awards

2016  Goethe-Institut Award for New Translation


2020  Translation of Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself shortlisted for Schlegel-Tieck Prize


2021  Translation of Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself shortlisted for Helen and Kurt Wolff's Translator Prize

Work

Translated publications

Sasha Salzmann, Glorious People

Pushkin Press, 2024

Dirk Kurbjuweit, The Freedom of Emma Herwegh

Text Publishing, 2023

Julia Holbe, Our Happy Days

Text Publishing, 2022

Dirk Kurbjuweit, The Missing

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2021 novel

Wolf Küper, One Million Minutes

Lagom/London, 2020 autobiography

Sasha Marianna Salzmann, Beside Myself

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2019 novel

Mareike Krügel, Look At Me

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2018 novel

Dirk Kurbjuweit, Twins

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2017 novel

Melanie Raabe, The Stranger

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2017 thriller

Anja Reich-Osang, The Scholl Case

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2016 true crime

Melanie Raabe, The Trap

Text Publishing/Melbourne; London/Mantle;New York/Grand Central, 2016 thriller

Dana Grigorcea, Dracula Park

Sandstone Press, 2023

Jan-Philipp Sendker, The Rebel and the Thief

Other Press, 2022

Alfred Döblin, Two Women and a Poisoning

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2021 true crime novel

Melanie Raabe, The Shadow

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2020 thriller

Florian Huber, Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2019 history

Carolin Emcke, How We Desire

Text Publishing/Melbourne, 2018 autobiographical essay

Dirk Kurbjuweit, Fear

Text Publishing/Harper Collins/Orion/Anansi, 2017 thriller

Gisa Klönne, Under the Ice

London/Manilla, 2017 thriller

Pia Ziefle, Suna

London/Manilla, 2017 novel

Gisa Klönne, Silent is the Forest

London/Manilla, 2016 thriller

Sascha Arango, The Truth and Other Lies

Text Publishing/Melbourne; London/Simon & Schuster/New York: Atria, 2015 thriller