And While We're Talking about PEN . . .

As if my inbox wasn’t jacked enough—trips to NY, Frankfurt prep, etc., and etc.—PEN is pouring on the press releases . . . Last night they announced the winners of this year’s Literary Awards. You can find them all here, but below are a few notable ones:

PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction ($25,000): Don DeLillo

PEN/W.G. Sebald Award for a Fiction Writer in Mid-Career ($10,000): Susan Choi
(The term “mid-career” sorta creeps me out . . . especially with my birthday coming up and the feeling that I very well may be at the mid-point of my life . . . )

PEN/Tuck Award for Paraguayan Literature ($3,000): Esteban Bedoya for El Apocalipsis según Benedicto
(Wonder if this will be published in English translation . . . I personally would be interested in taking a look at it for Open Letter, hint hint in a weirdly semi-public way)

PEN Award for Poetry in Translation ($3,000): Anne Carson for her translation from the Greek of An Oresteia
(God damn is Anne Carson amazingly talented)

PEN Translation Prize ($3,000): Michael Henry Heim for his translation from the Dutch of Wonder by Hugo Claus
(Yay for Archipelago and for MHH, who really is one of the absolute best and nicest translators in the world)