Yui Kajita
I am a translator, illustrator, and literary scholar, originally from the countryside in Kyoto and currently based in Germany.
About me
A common thread running through everything I do is storytelling — listening in to stories told by others and letting them be heard in new ways.
As a translator, I enjoy working on modern and contemporary prose, poetry, children’s books, folktales, and other projects related to art and culture. In 2021, I was shortlisted for the 5th JLPP International Translation Competition and took part in the BCLT Summer School with a full bursary, working with Polly Barton and the author Tomoka Shibasaki.
As an illustrator, I love using ink and watercolor to create dreamlike, whimsical worlds. I share more thoughts on what I do in each part of this website — as a word nerd, “concise” isn’t my defining feature…
I completed my PhD in English literature at the University of Cambridge in 2019. To stay close to what I love, I began my translation and illustration career around 2020. My publications include Yosano Akiko’s poetry in Modern Poetry in Translation (co-translated with Clara Marino, 2020) and Walter de la Mare: Critical Appraisals (co-edited with Angela Leighton and Anna Nickerson, 2022).
Experienced in collaborative work, I was a member of the Japan Past & Present Sources in Translation Planning Team in 2022, designing a multilingual, comprehensive database as part of the Yanai Initiative’s new digital hub for globalizing Japanese studies at UCLA and Waseda University.
I’m most at peace when I’m getting lost in drawing, curled up with a book, or exploring nature — a wide river flows through my hometown in Japan, surrounded by rice fields, bamboo forests, and mountains, and in New York, I grew up on a sycamore-lined street close to the sea. Now, I draw inspiration from taking long walks by the river and hiking in the mountains whenever I can get away.
Selected Awards
2021
- SCBWI-LA #KTIllustrates Contest: Runner up (Prompt: “Here you will find the dragon’s secret.”)
- The 5th JLPP International Translation Competition: Shortlisted (Texts: Seiko Tanabe and Hiromi Ito)
2019
2018
- University of Cambridge, Faculty of English, Member’s English Fund Scholarship for Academic Merit
- The Thomas Hardy Association Student Essay Prize: First Place (Title: “Hardy’s Questioning”)
- JASSO Postgraduate Scholarship for PhD (2015-18) and MPhil (2014-15)
2012 and earlier
- Ikuei Award for Academic Excellence, Doshisha University
- The 5th Kyorin University Translation Contest: First Place (Children’s story, EN to JP)
The words going out into the room seemed like actual presences, hard and independent; yet as she was listening they were changed by their contact with her.
– Virginia Woolf