Bill Johnston
Photo by Isabel Darcy-Johnston
Bio
Bill Johnston has published more than 30 translations from the Polish. His translation of Wiesław Myśliwski’s novel Stone Upon Stone won the PEN Translation Prize and the Best Translated Book Award for 2012. In November 2019, he received the National Translation Award in Poetry for his translation of Adam Mickiewicz’s 1834 epic poem Pan Tadeusz. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Guggenheim Foundation. For his work in promoting Polish literature abroad, he has been awarded the Transatlantyk Prize (2014) and the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit (2012). He teaches literary translation at Indiana University.
Project Description
To support the translation from the Polish of the first two books in the novel cycle Nights and Days by Maria Dąbrowska. Widely regarded as one of the greatest Polish novels of all time, Nights and Days is required reading in Polish schools and was adapted into a two-part movie in the 1970s that is still popular today. Dąbrowska (1889-1965) also wrote short story collections, children's literature, literary criticism, and works in translation, and was a graphic artist. By the end of her life, she had become a national treasure. Nights and Days, a moving family saga, has never been translated into English. This project seeks to translate the first third of this almost 1,800-page novel.
Ever since I first read Maria Dąbrowska’s magnificent novel Nights and Days, I’ve dreamed of being able to translate it. At the same time, I was awed by the beauty, the precision, and the understated eloquence of Dąbrowska’s language. Now, though far from certain of success, I feel at least ready to take on the challenge. I’m deeply grateful for the support of the National Endowment for the Arts—it shows me that my idea of making Dąbrowska’s work available in English is one that others also find enticing and worthwhile.