A meeting with Cécile Wajsbrot and Josephine Rijnaarts
Q&A with the winners of the Europese Literatuurprijs 2026 (European Literature Prize)
- Date
- 6 November 2026
- Time
- 16:00 -17:00
- Location
- University Library
- Room
- The Salon (floor-1)
Nevermore is a story of a woman translating the famous middle part ‘Time Passes’ from Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse (1927) into French – while on a translation fellowship in Dresden, she thinks about that city’s history, the destruction of the First World War so central to Woolf’s novel, and other places of loss and memory.
Together with translator Josephine Rijnaarts, Cécile Wajsbrot will be in Amsterdam before they accept their award, on Saturday, in The Hague. Make use of this exclusive opportunity to meet her and engage in a Q&A about her novel, its themes, and the art of translation. Space is limited, so please register in advance.
The conversation will be moderated by Jesse van Amelsvoort, writer, critic, and lecturer in modern European literature at the University of Amsterdam.
Cécile Wajsbrot (1954) is a French author living in Paris and Berlin. She wrote twenty novels and also works as a literary translator. In the 1930s, her family fled from Poland to France. During the Second World War, a part of her family was killed in Auschwitz. In 2016, she received the Prix de l’Académie de Berlin. Wajsbrot translated books from English and German into French, including Virginia Woolf, Violet Trefusis, and Stefan Heym.
Josephine Rijnaarts is a well-known translator from German, French and English into Dutch. Her translations include works by Esther Kinsky, Daniel Kehlmann, Aglaja Veteranyi, Lydie Salvayre and Josph Boyden. She received the Letterenfonds Translation Prize 2021 for her “virtuose courage as a translator, masterful control of the Dutch language, and stylistic brilliance.” Nevermore was also shortlisted for the Filter Vertaalprijs 2026.
