Jordan Stump, professor of French at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, has earned international recognition for his latest literary translation, which was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize.

Stump’s English translation of “The Witch,” a novel by French author Marie NDiaye, is among the books competing for the prestigious award, which honors a single work of fiction translated into English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland. Now in its 10th year, the International Booker Prize is the world’s most influential award for translated fiction. The winner will be announced May 8.

“I did not expect this at all,” Stump said. “For one thing, the translation hadn’t been published yet, and the novel is 30 years old, and that’s very unusual.”

Stump’s translation of “The Witch” was published by Penguin Random House on April 7. The novel centers on Lucie, a mediocre witch trapped in a failing marriage who must pass her powers on to her twin daughters, whose abilities far exceed her own.

Despite its supernatural elements, Stump describes the novel as grounded in deeply human experiences.

“It’s not really about witchcraft at all,” he said. “It’s about loss and the attempt to keep together something that is disintegrating. Her family is disintegrating; everyone is fleeing her. The story expresses an emotion that is probably universal.

“It’s fantastical, but the atmosphere is very everyday. You have to allow the fantastical and the ordinary to exist at the same time. It’s a balancing act.”

Stump has translated eight of NDiaye’s books and has followed her work since early in her career. He has also taught several of her novels at Nebraska, an experience he said helped him better understand the nuances of her writing and use of language.

“I felt like she was maybe a little too smart for me when I was first reading her,” he said. “I never quite really got everything, but her books always interested me. She’s a very complicated and subtle writer, and it took me a while to learn how to read her, and a while to learn how to translate her.”

Stump has previously earned acclaim for translating NDiaye’s work. His translation of “Ladivine” was longlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2016, and “The Cheffe” won the American Literary Translators Association’s Annual Translation Prize for Prose in 2021.

NDiaye herself praised Stump’s work. 

“I feel an infinite gratitude toward translators — and most particularly toward Jordan Stump, who’s been translating me for a long time now, with a steadfastness and a soundness that have earned him my very deep admiration,” she said in an interview with the Booker Prize media team.

Over his career, Stump has translated more than 30 novels. While his process is largely consistent, he said each project must inspire him.

“It really has to mean a lot to me,” he said. “If it doesn’t inspire a passion, it’s going to be flat, and that’s the worst thing you can do to a book.”

He begins each translation with what he calls a “very bad” rough draft, simply getting the language onto the page. Then, comes meticulous work on printed pages with red pens.

“The real translation happens in revision, going over it again and again,” Stump said. “Little by little, a voice starts to materialize, and it begins to feel like a book that exists on its own.”

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