My Work (Mit arbejde)

2023 Cercador Prize Finalist

Explores childbirth & motherhood by mixing different literary forms—fiction, essay, poetry, memoir, letters—with [Ravn’s] signature experimental flair.” — Sophia Stewart, The Millions 

My Work, originally published in Danish as Mit arbejde, won the Politiken Literature Prize in 2020. 

From the author of the International Booker Prize–shortlisted literary sensation, The Employees, comes a radical, funny, & mercilessly honest novel about motherhood.

My Work is a fervent, intimate, & compulsive examination of the relationship between motherhood, writing, & everyday life. In a mesmerizing, propulsive blend of prose, poetry, journal entries, & letters, Olga Ravn probes the pain, postpartum depression, housework, shopping, mundanity, & anxiety of motherhood, all the while celebrating the unbounded that comes from the love in a parent & child relationship—& rediscovering oneself through art.

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Olga Sofia Ravn is a Danish poet & novelist. Initially, she published poetry that was acclaimed by the critics, as was her 1st novel Celestine. Her novel The Employees, translated by Martin Aitken, was nominated for numerous prizes, including the International Booker Prize & the inaugural Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction. She is also a translator & has worked as a literary critic for Politiken. 

Jennifer Russell & Sophia Hersi Smith are Translators who won an American-Scandinavian Foundation Award for their co-translation of Rakel Haslund-Gjerrild’s All the Birds in the Sky