St. Jerome Award Went to Carmen Caro Dugo, Associate Professor at VU

Carmen Caro Dugo, Associate Professor at Vilnius University (VU), is the winner of this year’s St. Jerome Award for translations of Lithuanian literature into a foreign language. The prize is awarded annually on 30 September, International Translation Day.

C. C. Dugo was awarded the St. Jerome Award for her talent and beautifully worded and sonorous style in conveying the complex language of poetry and prose works from different periods and expressions. The jury consisted of Irena Aleksaitė, Alfonso Rascon Caballero, Birutė Jonuškaitė, Rūta Lazauskaitė, and Markus Roduner.

C. Dugo graduated in English and Spanish Philology from the University of Seville in 1986 and in Humanities from the University College Dublin in 1987. She was awarded PhD in Humanities at Trinity College Dublin in 1992. From 1998–1999, she studied the Lithuanian language at the Department of Lithuanian Studies, Vilnius University. As of 2000, she has been teaching Spanish at Vilnius University and is currently an Associate Professor at the Department of Romance Languages, Faculty of Philology. She is interested in Lithuanian and Spanish comparative grammar, artistic translation, translation theory and practice.

C. C. Dugo’s noteworthy prose and poetry translations into Spanish: Kristijonas Donelaitis’ The Seasons (Lith. Metai), Antanas Baranauskas’ The Forest of Anykščiai (Lith. Anykščių šilelis), Anthology of 20th century Lithuanian poetry Sinfonía de Primavera, and Dalia Grinkevičiūtė’s Lithuanians by the Laptev Sea (Lith. Lietuviai prie Laptevų jūros) (in collaboration with Margarita Sanos Cuesta). These are fundamental works of Lithuanian literature, but their Spanish texts are just as fundamental - they are examples of high-quality, meticulous, and smooth translation work. The translator is well-versed in translating texts of a wide variety of styles, accurately conveying the subtleties of various genres and registers into the target language, and finding the right Spanish expression for the old and specific lexis of the Lithuanian language. The rhythmic and sonorous descriptions in the translations of the poems by K. Donelaitis and A. Baranauskas have been rendered no less melodiously than in the original texts while perfectly preserving the texts’ stylistic unity. The same goes for the anthology of 20th-century Lithuanian poetry, Sinfonía de Primavera, compiled and translated by C. C. Dugas, which covers poems from Maironis to Sigitas Parulskis: the translator flawlessly renders texts of a wide variety of poets and poetesses, styles, and poetic forms into Spanish.

C. C. Dugo’s translations are a bridge between Lithuanian literature and the Spanish-speaking audience. They introduce Spanish-speaking readers to well-translated Lithuanian literary classics and the work of contemporary writers.

This year’s prize for the translation of foreign literature into Lithuanian was awarded to Danutė Sirijos Giraitė.

The St. Jerome Award, awarded by the Ministry of Culture and the Lithuanian Association of Literary Translators, will be presented to the winners on Friday, 30 September, at 4 PM at the White Hall in the Ministry of Culture.