ÁDÁM BODOR, born 22 February 1936 in Cluj, is an author of Transylvanian Hungarian origin and one of Hungary’s most revered writers. Bodor has won many literary prizes, including the Literature Prize of the Hungarian Arts Foundation (1996), the Sándor Márai Literature Prize for works published in Hungary and Abroad (1996), the Pr Literatura Prize of the National Association of Creative Artists (1996), Hungary’s Golden Wreath (1998), the Kossuth Prize (2003) (Hungary’s top award for writers), and the Artist of the Nation Award (2019).

His first book (The Witness) was published in 1969 in Romania, while in Hungary his debut piece was a collection of short stories entitled A High Mountain Pass (1980). He has been living in Hungary since the early 1980s; for a time, he was editor at Magvető Publishing House. In the 1990s, he became familiar to the wider reading public after the publication of his novels Sinistra Zone (1992), The Visit of the Archbishop (1999), and the most comprehensive collection of his short stories to date, Back to the Long-eared Owl (1997), as well as a confessional, autobiographical piece which was eventually given an interview form (The Smell of Prison, 2000). Bodor’s books have been published in more than twenty languages. Several of his works were made into films, including Zoltán Kamondi’s Dolina, based on The Visit of the Archbishop.

Bodor’s work in English translation includes The Sinistra Zone (2013, translated by Paul Olchváry). The Birds of Verhovina, translated by Peter Sherwood, will be his second book published in English.