International Translation Day, the largest coming-together for the UK translation community, will be held at Free Word on 30 September.

ITD features the opportunity for four translators to live-pitch new book translation proposals to four publishers. Those who have a ticket can submit their pitch by downloading, filling and returning this form. Submissions close at 12 noon Saturday 31 August.

Four translators will be chosen by the publishers to pitch their idea at ITD, and the successful participants will be given coaching before the event.

Publishers

Ailah Ahmed is Editorial Director of two imprints: Little, Brown and Virago Press. Her authors include Chigozie Obioma, Andrew Sean Greer and Niviaq Korneliussen and her list of translated fiction ranges from literary fiction to thrillers. Ailah is interested in a broad range of languages and in emotionally engaging stories with unforgettable characters (think The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany and Lullaby by Leila Slimani).

Emmie Francis is an editor at Faber & Faber where she acquires and edits literary fiction and non-fiction. Her recent acquisitions include Exit Body by Sam Byers and little scratch by Rebecca Watson. She also edits literature in translation, including The Sun on My Head by Geovani Martins (trans. Julia Sanches) and Night as It Falls by Jakuta Alikavazovic (trans. Jeffrey Zuckerman).  At Faber, Emmie has worked on the publications of Orhan Pamuk, Peter Carey, John Lanchester, Paul Auster, Sally Rooney, Leïla Slimani, Jenny Uglow, among others. Before joining Faber, Emmie worked at The Bodley Head/Vintage (Penguin Random House UK) and Grove Atlantic in New York. In 2019, she was a recipient of a Zev Birger Editorial Fellowship at the Jerusalem International Book Forum (JIBF). She is also a contributing editor to The White Review.    

Deborah Smith was born in Doncaster in 1987. Her most recent translations are The White Book by Han Kang and Unknown Night and Day by Bae Suah (forthcoming). She also works with translation as a writer and mentor, and as creative director of Tilted Axis Press, focusing on all forms of contemporary writing from across Asia.

Jacques Testard is a co-founder of The White Review and the founder and publisher of Fitzcarraldo Editions, an independent publishing house specialising in ambitious, innovative and imaginative contemporary fiction and essays. His translated authors include Svetlana Alexievich, Jean-Baptiste Del Amo, Mathias Enard, Annie Ernaux, Elfriede Jelinek, Rainald Goetz, Esther Kinsky, Fernanda Melchor, Clemens Meyer, Adania Shibli, Olga Tokarczuk and Alejandro Zambra.