Translation Prize Award Ceremony

The jury for the Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize is pleased to award the 2026 prize to Max Lawton for his translation of Schattenfroh by Michael Lentz, published by Deep Vellum.
Sylvia Cunningham will be awarded the annual Gutekunst Prize of the Friends of Goethe New York for her translation of an excerpt from Maren Wurster’s Hier bleiben können wir auch nicht (Berlin Verlag, 2025)

Established in 1996 and funded by the Friends of Goethe New York, the Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize honors an outstanding literary translation from German into English published in the USA the previous year. The prizewinning translator receives $5,000 as well as a fully funded trip to the Frankfurter Buchmesse from October 7-11, 2026.
The Gutekunst Prize of the Friends of Goethe New York was created to identify outstanding young translators of German literature into English and assist them in establishing contact with the translation and publishing communities.

You can read more about the prize-winning translations at the links below.

Goethe-Institut USA | Wolff Translator's Prize

Goethe-Institut USA | Gutekunst Prize

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Host or Publisher Goethe-Institut New York