Li Ang

Translators

Howard Goldblatt

Howard Goldblatt, Li Ang’s primary translator in English, has taught modern Chinese literature and culture for more than twenty-five years. He was awarded the Translation Robert Payne Award in 1985. Currently, he is Research Professor at the University of Notre Dame, where he directs the Center for Asian Studies. Founding editor of the scholarly journal Modern Chinese Literature (now Modern Chinese Literature and Culture), he is the author or editor of several books and many articles on modern and contemporary Chinese literature and culture. He is especially well known as a literary translator of fiction from China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Authors he has translated include many early 20th-century novelists and virtually all the major figures of the post-Mao era. In 1999, his translation of Notes of a Desolate Man (with Sylvia Li-chun Lin), by Taiwanese novelist Chu T’ien-wen, was honored as translation of the year by the American Literary Translators Association. His most recent translations include Wolf Totem by Jiang Rong, winner of the 2008 Man Asian Prize, Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out by Mo Yan, recipient of the 2009 Newman Prize for Chinese Literature, and Su Tong’s Boat of Redemption, winner of the 2010 Man Asian Prize. He has received two translation grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and, in 2009, a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is a member of the editorial and advisory boards of a dozen literary and scholarly journals, in Asia and in the West. His translations of Li Ang’s works include: The Butcher’s Wife, Flower Season, Wedding Ritual, Curvaceos Dolls, Test of Love and A Love Letter Never Sent. He and his wife divide their time between South Bend, Indiana, and Boulder, Colorado.

Updated: 8 March 2010