Michael Hofmann

Michael Hofmann (left) is one of the leading translators and cultural mediators enabling readers all over the English language world to discover German literature in translation. He's won every possible award for literary translation, most recently, the Thornton Wilder Prize worth $20,000 (US), but also the IMPAC award for his translation of Herta Mueller's Land of Green Plums. He plays a unique role in the translation world, with an equal reputation as a poet and a translator, and he is also known as a leading literary critic. He's in new Zealand on invitation from the New Zealand Centre for Literary Translation and Victoria University International institute of Modern letters.