World Languages & Literatures

The Department of World Languages & Literatures (WLL) offers a rigorous and comprehensive MFA program in Literary Translation that prepares students to pursue careers as literary translators or scholars of translation and literature.

The MFA program offers training in both translation theory and practice, as well as writing style in English. Faculty involved in the program come from WLL, Classical Studies, Romance Studies, and Creative Writing. To better situate students within the broader global context of the translation enterprise, students work with peers from around the world translating from different languages. The degree includes a capstone project, overseen by a faculty member who is a practicing translator in the same language as the student. A weekly lecture series in the spring exposes students to different approaches to translation of both prose and poetry and provides an opportunity to meet translators, authors, editors, and critics in an informal setting. The program also offers competitive summer internships.

The MFA in Literary Translation grows out of a long tradition of teaching translation at Boston University going back to the early 1980s, when the department’s renowned Translation Seminar began hosting regular lectures with prominent invited speakers in translation and translation studies. Building on that foundation, the program today is committed to training a new generation of literary translators equipped with a complete range of necessary linguistic, theoretical, and critical skills. For further details, please see the program website.