The Program in Literary Translation at Boston University is a vibrant center of conversation and exchange on the art and craft of literary translation. For nearly fifty years, we have been bringing together translators, writers, and scholars from around the world, fostering dialogue and mentorship that spans generations.
Building on this storied tradition, the MFA in Literary Translation, established in 2019, provides intensive training for emerging translators. Students work closely with faculty who are themselves professional translators, engaging with translation theory and practice while refining their skills as writers.
The Program in Literary Translation is an interdepartmental program that draws on faculty expertise across the departments of World Languages & Literatures, Classics, Romance Studies, English, and Creative Writing. We currently accept students translating into English from twelve languages: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Ancient Greek, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Persian, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish.
What happens when you translate a novel that's already translating between multiple cultures? In a wide-ranging conversation with Yasmeen Hanoosh for ArabLit Quarterly, BU Literary Translation faculty member Margaret Litvin explores the challenges and rewards of working with texts that refuse to stay in a single language. Drawing on her translations of Sonallah Ibrahim's Ice […]
On October 9th and 10th, our MFA program in Literary Translation had the privilege of hosting Susan Harris, Editorial Director of Words Without Borders, for two stimulating workshops on the practical aspects of translation. Harris, whose experience in translation publishing includes building Northwestern University Press's celebrated list of East European literature before joining Words Without […]
This past summer, two of our MFA students in Literary Translation gained real-world experience through internships with organizations in the literary translation field. Grace Ashton worked with Swan Isle Press, a small nonprofit publisher specializing in literature in translation, while Luisa Bocconcelli joined the editorial team at Words Without Borders, an online magazine for international […]
The Brink highlighted Associate Professor and Literary Translation Studies Director J. Keith Vincent's Genji poem project. Vincent and his students spent over nine years building Genjipoems.org, home to nearly 800 ancient poems. Read the full article here.
Many thanks to all those who attended the Translation Seminar this spring. This year’s series was moderated by Associate Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature Margaret Litvin. The recordings of the Spring 2025 BU Translation Seminar are now available for viewing here.
The origin story of BU’s MFA in Literary Translation goes back more than 40 years to a classroom in BU’s School of Theology. That’s where, beginning in 1978, the late Rodolfo Cardona, a professor of foreign language, first invited a small group of academic colleagues and students for a Friday afternoon discussion of the art […]
The Translation Program welcomed yet another group of talented translators this spring, including Boston University's own Dennis Wuerthner. This year’s series was moderated by Associate Professor of Japanese & Comparative Literature and Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies J. Keith Vincent. The recordings of the Spring 2024 BU Translation Seminar are now available for viewing here.
For the past two springs at Boston University, I was fortunate to teach the Seminar in Literary Translation, a landmark seminar founded and nurtured for three decades by Rosanna Warren. Formally called “The Practice and Theory of Literary Translation,” this project has a lot of moving parts. The base is a three-hour weekly course for […]