We are excited to announce that translator Nichola Smalley has been elected as Chair of SELTA after the retirement from office of Ian Giles.

A translator of both Swedish and Norwegian literature, Smalley’s professional background also includes time in the publishing industry as Publicity Director at And Other Stories. She is known for her particularly sensitive approach to the musicality of language (as well as any other music found in the text) and holds a PhD from UCL covering contemporary urban vernaculars in Swedish and UK rap, literature, and translation.

Smalley’s translations are regularly award-nominated, with recent accolades including winning a PEN Translates award in February 2024 to translate Andrzej Tichý’s Purity. Smalley’s admired translation of Tichý’s novel Wretchedness also won the Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize. She also served on the jury that awarded the 2023 Bernard Shaw Prize.

Outside the act of translation itself, she is also heavily involved in ensuring a bright future of Swedish to English literary translation. Smalley has mentored a number of junior literary translators, most recently on SELTA’s CPD programme, which ran from early this year and concluded at the end of October.

Smalley said: “I’m honoured to be tasked with chairing SELTA and am looking forward to working with the membership to ensure we are all able to further our creative practice and push for better working conditions. I’m extremely grateful to my predecessors, Ian Giles and Ruth Urbom for all the ideas and energy they brought to the role and hope to live up to the precedent they’ve set!”

Retiring Chair Ian Giles said: “Nicky has been a long-term member of SELTA who has added so much to the organisation over the years. I’ve every confidence that we will go from strength to strength under her direction.”

We are excited for the future of SELTA under Nichola’s tenure…