Katherine Van de Vate

Katherine Van de Vate is a literary translator specializing in modern Arabic fiction. Before transitioning to translation, she served as a U.S. diplomat with postings in Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, and the UAE, and later worked as an Arabic curaor at both the British Library and Princeton University. She holds a master’s degree in translation studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
Her translations have been featured in publications such as Words Without Borders, Asymptote, ArabLit Quarterly, Y’alla, Sekka, and The Markaz Review. Notably, her translation of Badriyah Al-Badri’s novel The Last Crossing was published by Dar Arab in 2024. Additionally, she was shortlisted for the 2021 ArabLit Story Prize for her translation of Karima Ahdad’s short story “The Baffling Case of the Man Called Ahmet Yilmaz.”