Deep Vellum announces partnership with The Alexander Grass Humanities Institute at Johns Hopkins

JULY 2, 2025 — The Alexander Grass Humanities Institute at Johns Hopkins and Deep Vellum are proud to partner in bringing the world’s greatest writers into dialogue across academic and public spheres. Beginning in 2025, the AGHI will support the production, publication, and promotion of one work of literary translation annually with a sustaining grant, a translator residency, and public events on the Johns Hopkins campus. By producing and promoting major works of literary translation, the AGHI and Deep Vellum aim to deepen literary engagement in the city of Baltimore, across the nation, and throughout the world.

"Deep Vellum is committed to publishing the sort of boundary-pushing, international work that humanistic scholars teach and analyze, and the AGHI is committed to fostering big conversations across the academic and public spheres,” says Jeanne-Marie Jackson, Director of the AGHI. “In that sense we've been partners for years, and it's truly gratifying to make our shared mission official. The fact is, universities and literary institutions need each other now more than ever.”

The first book to be supported by this partnership is the hotly anticipated Schattenfroh by Michael Lentz, translated from the German by Max Lawton—one of the books originally supported by the NEA grant that was terminated by the Trump administration in early May. Heralded as “a literary landmark” and “a novel of titanic ambition” in a starred review from Foreword Reviews, Schattenfroh arrives on August 19, 2025 and is available now for pre-order on the Deep Vellum website and wherever books are sold. Translator Max Lawton will be in residence at Johns Hopkins University this November, where he will participate in a series of events on campus, as well as public events at local Baltimore bookstores.

For all inquiries, please contact Publicity Director Nadine Santoro: nadine@deepvellum.org.

Deep Vellum is a literary arts organization and nonprofit publishing house founded in 2013 based in Dallas, TX. Deep Vellum’s mission is to bring the world into conversation through literature. Since its founding, Deep Vellum has expanded to encompass six distinct publishing imprints and is now the largest publisher of translated literature in the United States.

Founded in 2016 with a historic gift from the Alexander Grass Foundation, the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute (AGHI) aims to advance humanities scholarship and teaching at Johns Hopkins and promote literature, art, philosophy, and history in Baltimore, the nation, and the world. It serves as a focal point of programming for the 13 humanities departments in the university’s Krieger School of Arts and Sciences as well as related departments and programs, building on Johns Hopkins' rich and innovative history in humanistic studies.