Biographies of judges｜11th Japan International Translation Competition

Judging
Committee

©Danny Gugger

Sam Bett Translator of Japanese Literature: Born in 1986. Graduated from UMass-Amherst, majoring in English and Japanese Language & Literature. In 2015, Sam was awarded Grand Prize in the 2nd JLPP International Translation Competition. His translation work includes the Katanagatari series by NISIOISIN, The Flowers of Buffoonery and The Beggar Student by Osamu Dazai, and The Rope Artist by Fuminori Nakamura. His translation of Star by Yukio Mishima won the 2019-2020 Japan-US Friendship Commission Prize. He also co-translated Mieko Kawakami's works with David Boyd, including Breasts and Eggs, Heaven, and All the Lovers in the Night. Heaven was shortlisted for the 2022 International Booker Prize. His translation of The Night of Baba Yaga by Akira Otani won the 2025 Dagger Award for Crime Fiction in Translation. Alongside his translation work, he is a co-host of Us&Them, a Brooklyn-based reading series showcasing the work of writers who translate.

Stephen Snyder Translator of Japanese Literature, Dean of Language Schools and Vice President for Academic Affairs; Professor of Japanese Studies, Interim President, Middlebury College: Born in 1957. Earned Ph.D. from Yale University. He is the author of Fictions of Desire: Narrative Form in the Novels of Nagai Kafu and co-editor of Oe and Beyond: Fiction in Contemporary Japan. He has translated contemporary Japanese novels by Yoko Ogawa, Kenzaburo Oe, Ryu Murakami, Yu Miri, Kotaro Isaka, to name a few. He also published his translation of Rivalry: A Geisha's Tale by Nagai Kafu and Ashura Girl by Otaro Maijo under JLPP. His translation of Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa was shortlisted for the 2019 National Book Award for Translated Literature and the 2020 International Booker Prize. Mina’s Matchbox., also by Yoko Ogawa, was selected as one of TIME’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 in his English translation.

TEJIMA Yuki Translator of Japanese Literature: TEJIMA Yuki was born in Tokyo and raised in Los Angeles from the age of four. A graduate of University of California, Irvine, Yuki worked for fifteen years in film, television and commercial translation in New York City and Tokyo before shifting to literary translation. Her translation work includes Lost Souls Meet Under a Full Moon and How to Hold Someone in Your Heart by Mizuki Tsujimura, Someone to Watch Over You by Kumi Kimura, When the Museum is Closed by Emi Yagi, Then Why Ask Me To Come? by Risa Wataya, and Totto-chan: The Little Girl at the Window The Sequel by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi. She was awarded Second Prize in the English category of the 5th JLPP International Translation Competition.

Janine Beichman Scholar and translator of Japanese Literature, Professor Emeritus at Daito Bunka University: Earned her doctorate from Columbia University, specializing in Japanese literature. Her publications include Masaoka Shiki: His Life and Works, Embracing the Firebird: Yosano Akiko and the Rebirth of the Female Voice in Modern Japanese Poetry, and Drifting Fires: An American Nō. Her translation of Ōoka Makoto's poems, Beneath the Sleepless Tossing of the Planets: Selected Poems received the Japan-U.S. Friendship Foundation's Japanese Literature Translation Award. Her recent translations include Well-Versed: Exploring Modern Japanese Haiku (“Meiku no yuen” by Minoru Ozawa) and This Overflowing Light: Rin Ishigaki Selected Poems.

Robert Campbell Scholar of Japanese Literature, University Professor, Waseda University: Robert Campbell is a scholar of Japanese literature, Professor of Waseda University, Professor Emeritus at the University of Tokyo and former Director-General of the National Institute of Japanese Literature (NIJL). Born in New York City, he attended high school in San Francisco, studied in the Departments of Economics and Oriental Languages, University of California, Berkeley (B.A. 1981), and in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilization, Graduate School of Fine Arts, Harvard University (M.A. 1984; Ph.D. 1992). In addition to writing, editing and contributing to numerous volumes on Japanese literature, art and drama, Robert is active in the Japanese media as television host, news commentator, newspaper columnist, book reviewer and radio personality.

Meredith McKinney Translator of classical, early modern, and contemporary Japanese Literature, Honorary Associate Professor at the Australian National University: Meredith McKinney earned her PhD in classical Japanese literature from the Australian National University. After living in Japan for around twenty years, she returned to Australia where she now lives near a small country town in New South Wales. She has published over twenty translations. These include classics such as The Pillow Book, Hōjōki and Essays in Idleness; Kokoro and Kusamakura by Natsume Sōseki; and works by modern writers Furui Yoshikichi, Shimada Masahiko and Tanabe Seiko. She won the Japan-US Friendship Commission Prize for Furui Yoshikichi's Ravine and Other Stories. A Tale Unasked, her translation of Towazugatari, was published by Penguin Classics in 2025. Meredith is currently an Honorary Associate Professor at the Australian National University.