Bill Johnston is a prolific Polish language literary translator and associate professor of comparative literature at Indiana University. His work has helped to expose English-speaking readers to classic and contemporary Polish poetry and fiction. In 2008 he received the Found in Translation Award for his translation of new poems by Tadeusz Różewicz; this book was also a finalist for the National Books Critics Circle Poetry Award.
In 1999, he was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship for Poetry (Translation) for Balladina by Juliusz Słowacki, and in 2005 he received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for a translation of The Coming Spring by Stefan Żeromski. He is also a recipient of the Amicus Poloniae award, presented by the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland (2003) and the Diploma of the Polish Foreign Ministry (2004). In 2005, his translation of Magdalena Tulli’s Dreams and Stones won the Translation Award of AATSEEL (American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages).
TRANSLATIONS
Books
Wiesław Myśliwski: Stone Upon Stone. New York: Archipelago Books. In progress.
Andrzej Stasiuk: Fado. Champaign, IL: Dalkey Archive. In progress.
Juliusz Słowacki: Balladina. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. In press.
Jerzy Pilch: The Mighty Angel. Rochester, NY: Open Letter. In press.
Eugeniusz Tkaczyszyn-Dycki: Peregrinary. Brookline, MA: Zephyr Books. 2008.
Magdalena Tulli: Flaw. New York, NY: Archipelago Books. 2007.
Jan Kochanowski: The Envoys. Kraków, Poland: Księgarnia Akademicka. 2007.
Stefan Żeromski: The Coming Spring. London: Central European University Press. 2007.
Tadeusz Różewicz: new poems. New York, NY: Archipelago Books. 2007.
(winner of 2008 Found in Translation Award)
(finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Poetry Award, 2008).
Andrzej Stasiuk: Nine. New York, NY: Harcourt Brace. 2007.
The Song of Igor’s Campaign (from Old Russian). New York, NY: Ugly Duckling Presse. 2006.
Magdalena Tulli: Moving Parts. New York, NY: Archipelago Books. 2005.
Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński: White Magic and Other Poems. Los Angeles, CA: Green Integer. 2005.
Witold Gombrowicz: Polish Memories. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. 2004.
Witold Gombrowicz: Bacacay. New York, NY: Archipelago Books. 2004.
Magdalena Tulli: Dreams and Stones. New York, NY: Archipelago Books. 2004.
(winner of 2005 AATSEEL Translation Award)
Gustaw Herling: The Noonday Cemetery and Other Stories. New York, NY: New Directions. 2003.
(LA Times Notable Book of the Year, 2003)
Jerzy Pilch: His Current Woman. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press/Hydra Books. 2002.
Stefan Żeromski: The Faithful River. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. 1999.
Andrzej Szczypiorski: The Shadow Catcher. New York: Grove Press. 1997.
Bolesław Prus: The Sins of Childhood and Other Stories. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. 1996.
Maria Hochberg-Mariańska and Noe Grüss (Eds.): The Children Accuse. London: Vallentine Mitchell. 1996.
Andrzej Szczypiorski: Self-Portrait with Woman. New York: Grove Press. 1995.