Michelle Johnson

Photo by Shevaun Williams

Michelle Johnson is WLT's managing and culture editor.

Sunlight & Cedar by Ken Hada

Autumn 2020
Michelle Johnson

During quarantine, when not watching the news or reading a novel, I find my daily vision drawn to immediate surroundings: geese touching down in the parking lot where we safely walk (no need to come w...
World Literature Today’s 75 Notable Translations of 2019

December 10, 2019 | Michelle Johnson

In 2019 WLT continued publishing fiction, poems, interviews, and essays in translation—publishing more than 50 pieces from languages ranging from Albanian to Zoque—along with pieces by trans...
Serving as the London Book Fair’s Literary Translation Avatar: A Conversation with Jeremy Tiang

March 19, 2019 | Michelle Johnson

PHOTO: Edward Hill A prolific translator, playwright, novelist, and essayist from Singapore, Jeremy Tiang is the recipient of a PEN/Heim Grant, an NEA Literary Translatio...
The Bookshop Band Tours the US: A Conversation with the Bookshop Band

January 14, 2019 | Michelle Johnson

The Bookshop Band is traveling from Wigtown, Scotland, for its first US tour this week. Folk duo Ben Please and Beth Porter write and perform songs inspired by books using a var...
Critiquing Colonialism from Within: A Conversation with Helen Johnson & John Kinsella

Winter 2019
Michelle Johnson

In her densely layered, often two-sided canvases, Australian artist Helen Johnson invites viewers into an ongoing critique of Australia’s colonial legacy. With exhibits in London, Los Angeles, an...
Food and Migration: A Conversation with Artist Emeka Ogboh (Recipe Included)

Winter 2019
Michelle Johnson

Photo: Kake/Flickr Born in Enugu, Nigeria, and now dividing his time between Lagos and Berlin, Emeka Ogboh is an artist exploring migration, globalization, and colonialization through sound and...
Editor’s Pick: The Friend by Sigrid Nunez

Winter 2019
Michelle Johnson

Sigrid Nunez The Friend Riverhead Books D o the books we need find us? A few months ago, I purchased a used copy of Sigrid Nunez’s seventh novel, The Friend. The inside jacket promis...
World Literature Today’s 75 Notable Translations of 2018

December 11, 2018 | Michelle Johnson

As the year’s news of rising nationalistic strains and attacks against the press continued, the urgent need for translation became ever more apparent. More and more, translation across borders embo...
Day of the Dead: A One-Act Real Life and Death Play, A Conversation with Playwright Robert Con Davis-Undiano

October 31, 2018 | Michelle Johnson

Photo by Ernesto Rodríguez / Pixabay Robert Con Davis-Undiano’s play about the Day of the Dead premiered in Oklahoma City in October, leading up to the Day of the Dead on Novem...
“Art Should Make You Uncomfortable:” A Conversation with Vu Tran

November 2018
Michelle Johnson

Photo: Ulf Andersen Author of the noir novel Dragonfish, Vu Tran teaches English and fiction at the University of Chicago. Also a contributor to the collection of essays Th...
Music and Literature Reading List

September 2018
Michelle Johnson

Hanif Abdurraqib They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us: Essays Two Dollar Radio, 2017 Erica Dawson When Rap Spoke Straight to God: A Poem Tin House, 2018 Virginie Despe...
Capturing a Musical Reaction to Literature: A Conversation with Lusterlit’s Susan Hwang & Charlie Nieland

September 2018
Michelle Johnson

Photo: Carrie Lou Performing as Lusterlit, Susan Hwang and Charlie Nieland alternate lead vocals and harmonies while supporting each other on guitar, bass, synth, traditional Korean...
Tell Me about a Complicated Woman: A Conversation with Therese Bohman

April 10, 2018 | Michelle Johnson

Swedish novelist Therese Bohman is a columnist for Expressen, writing about literature, art, culture, and fashion. The English translation of her debut novel, Drowned, ...
It Is Solved by Walking: A Conversation with Writer-Flâneuse Kathleen Rooney

March 2018
Michelle Johnson

photo: joe mazza Kathleen Rooney is the author of eight books of poetry, nonfiction, and fiction, including the novel O, Democracy! and the novel in poems Robinson Alone. With E...
“Treasuring the Tradition of Inspired Resistance”: A Conversation with Maureen Freely

January 2018
Michelle Johnson

Maureen Freely is currently the president of English PEN and a writer, translator, and the head of the Department of English at the University of Warwick. Freely is the English translator of five n...
World Literature Today’s 75 Notable Translations of 2017

December 12, 2017 | Michelle Johnson

Looking back on 2017, it’s easy to declare the year a success for literary translation, which continued to thrive and move in exciting new directions. Of note, Emily Wilson translated The Odyssey...
Browse: The World in Bookshops, Ed. Henry Hitchings

September 2017
Michelle Johnson

Browse: The World in Bookshops Ed. Henry Hitchings Pushkin Press, 2016 Don’t mistake Browse for a collection of breezy tributes to writers’ favorite bookshops. The essays in this lit...
Michelle Johnson’s Summer Reads

May 2017
Michelle Johnson

As much as Managing Editor Michelle Johnson loves traveling, she also loves returning home. Her summer reading list reflects a similar course this year. Eli...
World Literature Today’s 75 Notable Translations of 2016

December 13, 2016 | Michelle Johnson

In our fifth annual list of “75 Notable Translations,” we again offer an admittedly incomplete collection of the year’s English translations. And again, we invite you to share your favorites from the...
Rotten Row, by Petina Gappah

November 2016
Michelle Johnson

Petina Gappah Rotten Row Faber & Faber 2016 Petina Gappah’s new collection of stories is named after the street where the criminal courts in Harare sit: Rotten Row, where the powerful...
“Always and Everywhere a Book Is Waiting for Me”: A Conversation with Lidija Dimkovska

November 2016
Michelle Johnson

Lidija Dimkovska. Photo by Tihomir Pinter It’s 1984 and two twelve-year-old sisters are playing a sidewalk game in communist Yugoslavia, only these sisters are unique: they are conjoined twins, join...
Editor’s Note

November 2016
Michelle Johnson

Pay inequality. Sexual assault on college campuses. International acts of misogynistic violence. Sexism at the orchestra conductor’s podium. These and other headlines persist as World Literature T...
Michelle Johnson’s Summer Reads

May 2016
Michelle Johnson

With two novels and one book of literary miscellany, WLT managing editor Michelle Johnson’s summer reading list is taking shape. Though she’ll no doubt spend many early morni...
Botswana Lit: From Stage to Page to Screen

March 28, 2016 | Michelle Johnson

A Conversation with Donald Molosi In January The Mantle published We Are All Blue, a collection of two plays by the Botswana actor and playwright Donald Molosi, including an introduction...
Editor’s Pick: The Book of Tokyo: A City in Short Fiction

November 2015
Michelle Johnson

Jim Hinks, Masashi Matsuie & Michael Emmerich, eds. Manchester. Comma Press. 2015. ISBN 9781905583577. This new collection of short stories by Japanese writers, all set in Tokyo,...