Lin King ’22 has won the 2024 National Book Award in Translated Literature for her work translating Yáng Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue to English from its original Mandarin Chinese.  

Competing in an original pool of 141 entrants in the category, King’s translation was named to the longlist in September, a finalist in October, and finally the winner on Wednesday night at the 75th National Book Awards Ceremony in New York City.

The novel follows the unlikely relationship of two women in 1930s Taiwan, a Japanese writer and her Taiwanese interpreter, as they tour the island nation under Japanese rule. The Translated Literature prize is particularly fitting for the book’s exploration of language, culture, and interpretation.

King accepted the award with Shuang-zi, who delivered remarks in Mandarin, which King then translated for the audience. “Some people ask me why I write about things from a hundred years ago,” King translated.  “I always tell them, writing about the past is a means of moving toward the future.

“More than a century ago, some Taiwanese people began making the assertion, ‘Taiwan belongs to the Taiwanese,’” she continued. “Today, many Taiwanese continue to assert this, but now we are addressing it to a different audience. Before, we were saying it to the Japanese. Now, we are saying it to the Chinese.”

Source: Columbia University School of the Arts

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