September 24th 2025
The publishing house Antolog from Skopje announces:
FIVE FINALISTS FOR THE "DRAGI" AWARD 2025
At its penultimate deliberation for awarding the “Dragi” Аward for Best Translation, the jury—composed of Anastasija Gjurchinova PhD (chair) Jana Jana Mihajlovska PhD, and Ivan Šopov (members) has decided decided that five translators would enter the final round of selection, with editions published by five publishing houses and translations made from four different languages (listed in alphabetical order according to the first letter of the translator’s name):
- Ermis Lafazanovski for the translation from Romanian of “The summer my mother had green eyes” ( „Летото во кое мама имаше зелени очи“) by Tatiana Țîbuleac, published by “Tri”,2024;
- Jasminka Markovska for the translation from Norwegian of “ Morning and night” ( „Утро и вечер“ ) by Jon Fosse, published by Artkonekt2024;
- Kalina Maleska for the translation from English of “Free: Coming of Age at the End of History” („Слобода: созревање на крајот на историјата“) by Lea Ypi, published by “Ili-Ili”,2024;
- Lidija Tanuševska or the translation from Polish of “The Empusium” („Емпусион“) by Olga Tokarczuk, published by "Antolog"2025;
- Milan Damjanoski for the translation from English of “Ten stories” („Десет раскази“) by O. Henry, published by “Svetla komora”,2024;
In partnership with the Faculty of Philology “Blaže Koneski” in Skopje, the announcement and presentation of the “Dragi” Awards will take place on October 2 (Thursday) at 10:30 a.m. in the Aula of the Faculty of Philology “Blaže Koneski,” with a formal ceremony held in honor of the winner and the nominees.
A Brief Presentation of the Finalists
Ermis Lafazanovski (1961) is a contemporary Macedonian short story writer, novelist, historian and literary theorist, folklorist and translator.
He has published several works in the field of folklore, literature and cultural anthropology. He has made a significant contribution to contemporary Macedonian prose. Due to his innovative approach to storytelling, he has received several literary awards, such as: the "Stale Popov" award of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences, the "Prose Masters" award, awarded by the "Macedonia Present" foundation, as well as the first winner of the award for best unpublished novel for children and young adults "Olivera Nikolova" 2025. His literary opus consists of several novels, collections of short stories and scientific studies. He is also actively involved in the translation of contemporary Romanian prose into Macedonian. So far, he has translated about twenty novels by famous Romanian authors. He is a member of the Macedonian Writers' Association and the Macedonian PEN Center.
Jasminka Markovska is a translator and writer from Skopje. She graduated from the Department of General and Comparative Literature at the Faculty of Philology “Blaže Koneski” in Skopje, as well as from Rutgers University in New Jersey, USA. She obtained her Master’s degree at the University of Oslo, Norway. She is the author of several plays,
poetry, and literary essays. She has translated numerous prose and poetry works to and from English, Norwegian, and Macedonian. She currently lives in Norway.
Kalina Maleska is a writer, professor, literary translator. Her stories have been translated into several languages and published in magazines in the country and abroad, and she has also participated in several Macedonian and international literary festivals. About the novel The World I Chose she has received the Novel of the Year Award for 2024, awarded by the Slavko Janevski Foundation for the Advancement and Promotion of Cultural Values. She has also won several literary residencies. She works as a professor of English literature at the Blaže Koneski Faculty of Philology at UKIM in Skopje. She received her doctorate in 2012 with a thesis on the phenomenon of power. In terms of translating books from English to Macedonian, Maleska has translated a dozen literary works by authors such as Lorne Sterne, Mark Twain, Junichiro Tanizaki, Ambrose Bierce, L. Frank Baum, Katerina Babkina, Claire Keegan and Lea Ippy.
Lidija Tanuševska (1969) is a resident professor at the Department of Slavic Studies at the Faculty of Philology "Blaže Koneski" in Skopje. She received her MA in 2003 and her PhD in 2010 from the same faculty. She worked as a Macedonian language lecturer at Polish universities in Katowice and Krakow, and also as a lecturer and head of the translation workshop at the International Seminar on Macedonian Language, Literature and Culture in Ohrid. Since 2010, she has been teaching courses in Polish literature and courses in Practice and Theory of Translation from Polish to Macedonian and vice versa. She is the author of numerous scientific articles as well as the professional monograph "Contribution to the Confrontational Grammar of the Macedonian and Polish Languages". She is engaged in literary translation from Polish to Macedonian and is a two-time winner of the "Golden Pen" award. In 2015, she received the "Ryszard Kapuściński Award for Translation into a New Language" in Poland.
Milan Damjanoski (1977) works at the Department of English Language and Literature at the Faculty of Philology "Blaže Koneski", where he currently holds the position of full professor of English Literature and Conference Interpreting, teaching the subjects English Literature, Theory of Translation and Interpreting, Conference Interpreting. In 2015 he defended his doctoral dissertation "Voice and Identity in the Literary Works of Robert Browning, Blaže Koneski, James Joyce and Slavko Janevski". With his papers, he participated in several domestic and international professional conferences. He published his papers in several renowned domestic and international professional journals and collections. He was a member of the editorial board of the international journal "Blesok", and is currently the president of the organizing board of the Young Translator Award "Babylon ZPRM" of the Association of Translators and Interpreters of the Republic of Macedonia.
This year’s edition of the “Dragi” Award is organized by Antolog Publishing House, with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the Republic of Macedonia and in cooperation with the Faculty of Philology “Blaže Koneski” – Skopje. The award consists of “Dragi” statuette and a cash prize of 40,000 denars.
Initially, 35 prose works by 33 translators, published by 18 publishing houses or individuals, for translations made from 17 different languages were nominated for this years’ “Dragi” award. From this year, a priority literary category was introduced for the first time, which will change every year.. For 2025 it is prose (fiction) and includes works such as novels, short story collections, essays, diaries, etc.
The International “Dragi” Award Presented in Ohrid
As previously announced, this year’s recipients of the 2025 International “Dragi” Award for the most significant translation of a literary work by a Macedonian author are Christina E. Kramer and Rawley Grau, for their translation from Macedonian into English of "The Long Coming of the Fire” (Долго доаѓање на огнот) by Aco Šopov published in 2023 by the American publishing house Deep Vellum Press. The award ceremony took place for the first time in Ohrid, on September 11th at 11:30 a.m., in the Congress Center of Ss. Cyril and Methodius University (UKIM), as part of the XII Macedonian–North American Conference on Macedonian Studies. The translation of this representative selection of Aco Šopov’s poetry was published to mark the centenary of the author’s birth and represents a major cultural and literary event in promoting Macedonian literature beyond its national borders. With this translation, the work of one of Macedonia’s greatest poets has finally gained an equal place in the English-speaking world, where it had previously been almost unknown.
The annual award for best literary translation in Мacedonian - Dragi was announced in 2022 with the first honorary recognition awarded to Dragi Mihajlovski (1951-2022), a Мacedonian writer, translator, essayist and professor. Besides his prose work, Mihajlovski has left a meaningful and eternal footstep in Macedonian culture with the translation of Shakespeare, Milton, Shelley, Blake, Eliot. and others. He has published several studies and essays about the theory of translation and his opinions about literary translation have also inspired students at the Faculty of Philology "Blaže Koneski" in Skopje, where he was a professor.
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