Saskia Vogel

American writer and translator

Saskia Vogel

Vogel at the 2024 National Book Awards finalist reading

Born|

Saskia Maria Desiree Vogel

(1981-09-17) September 17, 1981 (age 43)

Los Angeles, California, U.S.

Nationality| American, Swedish
Occupation(s)| Author, translator

Saskia Maria Desiree Vogel (born September 17, 1981) is an American-Swedish author, translator, and editor. Her debut novel, Permission, explores the question “How do I want to be loved?” through the story of a grieving young woman’s relationship with the dominatrix next door who’s renting a room to her oldest client. Set in coastal Los Angeles, it pursues a new understanding of the erotic and queer family-building. It was first published in English in 2019,[1][2] and later in French,[3] German,[4] Spanish,[5] Italian,[6] and Swedish.[7]

Vogel's work as a writer and translator centers hidden, underrepresented, and misunderstood narratives. Central themes of her writing include language, power, and sexuality. These themes carry over into her translation work, which expands into formal experimentation with language, trauma, migration, and Indigenous histories.

Vogel’s translations and writing have appeared in publications such as Granta,[8][9][10][11] Granta Sweden,[12] the New York Times,[13] The New Yorker,[14] The Paris Review,[15][16] The White Review,[17] and The Quietus.[18] She received an honorable mention from the Pushchart Prize in 2017 for her "Sluts", first published by The Offing.[19] Her translation of Lina Wolff's The Polyglot Lovers (published by And Other Stories in 2019) was described by TLS as "an impeccable pairing, given Vogel’s previous form with disrobers of the misogynist regalia".[20][21] In 2024, her translation of Linnea Axelsson’s Aednan was a finalist for the National Book Award (Translated Literature): “Ædnan is a layered translation from the Swedish—a resonant telling of Sámi-speaking Indigenous peoples’ lost language and migrant history, revealed by Saskia Vogel’s inspired English rendering.”[22]

Currently residing in Berlin, Germany, Vogel has lived in Sweden, the UK, and the US.

## Career

[edit]

Vogel started her career in 2007 as a managing editor at the AVN (Adult Video News) Media Network and then from 2010-2013 worked as Granta magazine’s global publicist. Since 2013, Vogel has been a freelance Swedish-to-English literary translator, translating leading Swedish authors such as Birgitta Trotzig, Balsam Karam, Karolina Ramqvist, Katrine Marcal, Johannes Anyuru, and Rut Hillarp.

Permission (2019), her debut novel, was published in six languages and was longlisted for the Believer Book Award.[23][24]

Vogel completed her translation of the National-Book-Award-nominated novel-in-verse Aednan during her time as Princeton University’s Fall 2022 Translator in Residence, and wrote about the translation process in the 2023 essay “The Same River Twice: Notes on Reading, Time, and Translation.” She has hosted workshops on translation, writing, and the editing process. She has been a visiting speaker at a number of universities, including Konstfack Stockholm, UC Berkeley, Bard College Berlin, University of Paderborn, and the Free University of Berlin. She has also appeared at numerous festivals and events, including at the Literarische Colloquium Berlin, the London Literature Festival, the Edinburgh International Book Festival, the Internationales Literaturfestival Berlin, and Pordenonelegge.

Vogel worked with publisher and founder Lucy Roeber to relaunch the magazine Erotic Review, reconceived for a contemporary audience in Spring 2024. Designed by Studio Frith, this new iteration of the 30-year-old British publication is reimagined as a platform for art and literature that explores humanity through the lens of desire. Vogel serves as deputy editor of the magazine.

## Translated works

[edit]

* Aednan by Linnea Axelsson. 2024.
* The Singularity by Balsam Karam. 2024.
* The Devil’s Grip by Lina Wolff. 2024.
* Caesaria by Hanna Nordenhök. 2024.
* The Ways of Paradise by Peter Cornell. 2024.
* Days and Days and Days by Tone Schunnesson. 2023.[25]
* The Bear Woman by Karolina Ramqvist. 2022.
* Strega by Johanne Lykke Holm. 2022.
* The October Child by Linda Boström Knausgård. 2021.
* W. by Steve Sem-Sandberg. 2021.
* In the Vienna Woods The Trees Remain by Elisabeth Åsbrink. 2020.[26]
* The Summer of Kim Novak by Håkan Nesser. 2020.
* Many People Die Like You by Lina Wolff. 2020.[27]
* Our House Is on Fire by Greta Thunberg, Malena Ernman et al. (co-translated with Paul Norlén) 2020.[28]
* Girls Lost by Jessica Schiefauer. 2020.[29]
* They Will Drown in Their Mothers' Tears by Johannes Anyuru. 2019.[30]
* The Polyglot Lovers by Lina Wolff. 2019.[31]
* The White City by Karolina Ramqvist. 2018.[32]
* Acts of Infidelity by Lena Andersson. 2018.[33]
* The Anatomy of Inequality by Per Molander. 2016.[34]
* The Book of Palms by Johanna Ekström. 2016.
* Who Cooked Adam Smith's Dinner? by Katrine Marçal. 2015.[35]
* All Monsters Must Die: An Excursion to North Korea by Magnus Bärtås and Fredrik Ekman. 2015.[36]

## Awards

[edit]

* Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize Longlist (2025) for The Singularity by Balsam Karam
* National Book Award Finalist in Translated Literature (2024) for Aednan by Linnea Axelsson
* Warwick Prize for Women in Translation Longlist (2024) for Aednan by Linnea Axelsson
* University of Iowa’s Translators’ Choice Award (2024) for The Singularity by Balsam Karam
* Bernard Shaw Prize (2023) for Strega by Johanne Lykke Holm
* Princeton Translator in Residence (Fall 2022) [37]
* English PEN Translation Award Finalist for Girls Lost by Jessica Schiefauer (2021)
* Berlin Senate Grant for Writers of Non-German-language Literature (2021)
* CLMP Firecracker Award Winner for Fiction (2020) for They Will Drown in Their Mothers’ Tears by Johannes Anyuru [38]
* Believer Book Award Longlist (2019) for Permission by Saskia Vogel
* Petrona Award Shortlist (2018) for The White City by Karolina Ramqvist[39]
* English PEN Translates Award (2017) for The Polyglot Lovers by Lina Wolff
* Pushcart Prize Honorable Mention for Nonfiction (2017)

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Permission.
2. ^ "Permission by Saskia Vogel – quietly subversive debut". TheGuardian.com. 17 March 2019.
3. ^ "Saskia Vogel, "Permission" (La Croisée)". Livres Hebdo (in French). Retrieved 2025-04-11.
4. ^ deutschlandfunk.de (2020-02-19). "Saskia Vogel: "Permission" - Sexualität abseits von Klischees". Deutschlandfunk (in German). Retrieved 2025-04-11.
5. ^ "Soy una pornógrafa".
6. ^ ""Consenso" - Saskia Vogel".
7. ^ Aschenbrenner, Jenny (10 July 2019). "Befriande rakt om erotik som tröst". Svenska Dagbladet.
8. ^ "A Woman Screaming". 30 July 2019.
9. ^ "Beyond Deep Throat | Part I". Granta. 2023-03-13. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
10. ^ "Beyond Deep Throat | Part II". Granta. 2023-03-30. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
11. ^ "Siblings". Granta. 2022-11-17. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
12. ^ Vogel, Saskia (2015-10-23). Slampor - en e-singel ur Granta #6 (in Swedish). Albert Bonniers förlag. ISBN 978-91-0-016253-5.
13. ^ Knausgard, Linda Bostrom (2020-12-05). "Opinion | A Poet's View of the Year: Longing for Our Own Lives". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
14. ^ Ekström, Johanna (2021-07-22). "Listening for the Click". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
15. ^ "The Ways of Paradise: Selected Notes from a Lost Manuscript by Peter Cornell, translated by Saskia Vogel". The Paris Review. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
16. ^ "The Swedish Gangster's Wife's Bag". 15 March 2017.
17. ^ "Ways of Submission". The White Review. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
18. ^ "The Quietus | Film | Film Features | Tug of Yore: Things Learned at Helsinki's Viva Erotica Festival". 29 May 2015.
19. ^ "Sluts". 23 May 2016.
20. ^ "The Polyglot Lovers by Lina Wolff | Book review | The TLS". TLS. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
21. ^ "PEN Translates awards go to books from 15 countries | the Bookseller".
22. ^ "Ædnan". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2025-04-11.
23. ^ Akbar, Arifa (March 17, 2019). "Permission by Saskia Vogel – quietly subversive debut". www.theguardian.com.
24. ^ Gilmartin, Sarah. "Permission review: Compelling take on sex and power in LA". The Irish Times.
25. ^ "Your #IWD2023 Reading List". 8 March 2023.
26. ^ "AND IN THE VIENNA WOODS THE TREES REMAIN | Kirkus Reviews".
27. ^ "Many People die Like You".
28. ^ "How Greta Thunberg Transformed Existential Dread into a Movement". The New Yorker. 6 April 2020.
29. ^ "Deep Vellum Publishing".
30. ^ "Review of They Will Drown in their Mothers' Tears". 27 October 2019.
31. ^ "The Polyglot Lovers".
32. ^ "Fiction Book Review: The White City by Karolina Ramqvist, trans. From the Swedish by Saskia Vogel.. Black Cat, $16 trade paper (176p) ISBN 978-0-8021-2595-8". February 2017.
33. ^ "Mixed feelings - Fiction".
34. ^ Molander, Per (2016). The anatomy of inequality : its social and economic origins--and solutions. Brooklyn. ISBN 978-1-61219-569-8. OCLC 950750915.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
35. ^ Lowrey, Annie (10 June 2016). "'Who Cooked Adam Smith's Dinner?' by Katrine Marçal". The New York Times.
36. ^ "Nonfiction Book Review: All Monsters Must die: An Excursion to North Korea by Magnus Bartas and Fredrik Ekman, trans. From Swedish by Saskia Vogel. House of Anansi (PGW/Perseus, U.S. Dist.; UTP, Canadian dist.), $22.95 trade paper (288p) ISBN 978-1-77089-880-6". January 2016.
37. ^ "'It's all I ever wanted to do, sit with language': Q&A with Translator in Residence Saskia Vogel | Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication (PTIC)". ptic.princeton.edu. Retrieved 2025-04-12.
38. ^ "Make some noise: here are the winners of CLMP's Firecracker Awards!". Literary Hub. 2020-06-30. Retrieved 2025-04-12.
39. ^ "The Petrona Award 2018 - the Shortlist".

## External links

[edit]

* Official website

Authority control databases

International|

* ISNI
* VIAF
* WorldCat

National|

* Germany
* United States
* Czech Republic
* Israel

Other|

* IdRef
* Yale LUX