Kansas-born poet Ben Lerner, author of Mean Free Path (2010), Angle of Yaw (2006), and The Lichtenberg Figures (2004), has become the first American poet to win the Preis für International Poesie der Stadt Münster, a poetry translation award given biennially by the city of Münster, Germany. Lerner, whose books are all published by Copper Canyon Press, won for his debut collection, translated into German by Steffen Popp as Die Lichtenbergfiguren and published by Germany’s Luxbooks.
Past winners of the prize, given since 1993, include Tomaž Šalamun, Hugo Claus, Zbigniew Herbert, and Inger Christensen. Lerner was selected for the tenth award by judges Urs Allemann, Michael Braun, Cornelia Jentzsch, Johan P. Tammen, Wendela Beate Vilhjalmsson, and Norbert Wehr.
In the video below, Lerner reads from The Lichtenberg Figures at the College of New Jersey.