Keith Waldrop, an old teacher of mine, has just won the National Book Award. Keith mentioned to me when he was at the Kelly Writers House for a reading earlier this month that it was nice to be nominated, but he wasn’t sure what would come of it, if he won. Hopefully what comes of it is a bit more recognition for someone who’s contributed more to international literature than most writers could do in three or four lifetimes. With Rosmarie Waldrop, he edited Burning Deck magazine, which eventually became the press that published a lot of language writing and slews of translations from French writers, such as Anne-Marie Albiach, Claude Royet-Journoud and Emmanuel Hocquard, and German-language writers, such as Elke Erb and Gerhard Roth.

Cheers to Keith!