‘Prizes are everything’ – Jenny Erpenbeck and Michael Hofmann on their International Booker win, one year on

Thinking back to the evening of Tuesday 21 May 2024 – could you describe how it felt to win the International Booker? 

Jenny: I was seriously prepared to not win the prize as one should be. So when the winner was announced I simply didn’t recognise the word ‘Kairos’ or grasp what was happening. It was only when I saw the excited faces around me that I understood that it must be us who had won. It felt unreal. 

Michael: Amazing, of course. I think everyone at the table clocked it before I did. I’m still caught in the moment before, people are looking at me, and jumping up and running and shouting, and I’m thinking: What are they doing? What’s this about? At the same time, I think, by rights, yes. To me, the book felt like a proper winner; Jenny’s reviews were extraordinary. I didn’t think I was participating at a travesty, in other words. 

Looking back at your past 12 months as International Booker winners, is there anything you wish you’d known then that you know now?  

Jenny: What a luxury it is to have enough time for writing a book.   

Michael: No, I’ve returned to the ranks, following a glamorous secondment. 

How did people react in Germany to you winning the International Booker? Did it affect the book’s fortunes there?  

Jenny: The book was sold out the first day after the prize announcement. And the sales went on and on for almost the whole year. People would congratulate me on the street. For some media it came as a big surprise. How could it be that someone from the former East won this prestigious prize? The German media are mostly run by Westerners, so there’s generally less interest in specific East German subjects, especially when they suspect us of undermining the common narrative of having been “saved” by the unification.    

Michael: To me, not at all. And I am German, and was in Germany after May and through the summer. With Jenny, it’s of course another story. Perhaps it’s too much to expect that Germans would read it in English… Of course they read the original. The Booker is out there on its own. Something I said in advance of the prize seems to have been borne out: that it’s a prize, in this order, for a book, an author, and a translation. I think an interest in translation and translators has yet to be fully discovered or generated. A way of talking about our work that makes sense, that’s neither lame nor hyperbolic. And not just in the UK either.

What do you think of this year’s shortlist?  

Jenny: The shortlist shows a great variety of different voices, as it should be. I like that kind of a choir. All the writers on the shortlist are well worth reading but, like in the conclave, only one will walk out as the Pope. 

Michael: I’m a translator, by Joseph Brodsky’s definition, I lag behind the original. I’m really enjoying reading Gospodinov (the 2023 winner). My bad. In my own defence, I’ve hardly set foot in the UK or in English bookshops this past year. 

What advice would you give to this year’s winning author and translator?  

Jenny: Think carefully which invitations to accept and how many interviews to give. Plan some breaks for doing nothing but being yourself. Enjoy the inspiring trips and encounters that come with the success.  

Michael: Take it personally and enjoy it while it lasts. There’s (probably) not another one to come. It’s not the new normal, and won’t re-base your life or work. Practically, I would urge you to go to the festivals in India. 

Why do prizes like the International Booker matter?  

Jenny: They remind the reader that a book is something very alive.  

Michael: I actually think prizes are everything. There’s no life without prizes. I like to say. In my lifetime, the graph of creative people has had the mid-range taken out of it, and there are highs and (mostly) lows.