Starting with the benevolent support of two universities, propelled by the guidance of farseeing leadership and staff in Dallas, leavened by a steady infusion of new voices and the rising membership participation represented by the Board and Officers, ALTA over these twenty years has broadened its capacity to seek and implement the finest standards of literary translation while fostering a community for its wide-spread laborers engaged in the transmission of international thought. While the gown and the town of the group keep in touch throughout the year by means of publications, ALTA is certainly at its peak during the conferences. It is particularly then that we can enjoy the qualities of open, informal inquiry and exchange, of nurturing welcome for newcomers alongside recognition of seasoned performance, all taking place in the truly rare atmosphere of cooperation and affection which keeps us coming back.

Lee Fahnestock has translated many works from the French. They include the collection of short stories Little Girls Breathe the Same Air As We Do (1979) by Paul Fournel; together with Norman MacAfee the revision of C.E. Wilbour's 1862 translation of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables (1987); several works by Francis Ponge, and together with Norman MacAfee two major volumes from the works of Jean-Paul Sartre: Witness to My Life: The Letters of Jean-Paul Sartre to Simone de Beauvoir, 1926-1939 (1992) and Quiet Moments in the War: The Letters of Jean-Paul Sartre to Simone de Beauvoir, 1940-1963 (1993).