“This brilliant and unflinching work deserves to be a classic.” —Publishers Weekly

"A radically funny and ruthless look at motherhood." —Time Magazine

“If The Employees asks what truly separates different classes of labouring life forms, My Work opens up a chasm between one woman and herself, who after giving birth “became less human.” —The Guardian

“A stunning book that speaks aloud thoughts the reader believed had been theirs alone in long nursery hours of the night.” —Kirkus Reviews

“On the surface, My Work seems quite different in scope [from The Employees]…but something tells me that interacting with humanoids and sentient space objects have more in common with the first stages of motherhood than one might think.” ―Eliza Smith, Lit Hub

“Explores childbirth and motherhood by mixing different literary forms—fiction, essay, poetry, memoir, letters—with [Ravn’s] signature experimental flair.” —Sophia Stewart, The Millions

“This novel from Olga Ravn, this new golden notebook, needs to be read by absolutely anyone who has known the quiet madness and claustrophobic happiness of the interior, especially mothers who also long for a life of literature. But this novel absolutely needs to be read by everyone else as well. Oh Olga Ravn, always inventing new forms, you are a genius. How do you do it?” —Kate Zambreno, author of The Light Room

“My Work is ferocious, horrific, elegant, insightful, irreverent, and funny. Can a woman still be a person after motherhood? Of course not, Ravn argues, or rather, admits. And in prose, poems, and journal entries, she documents all the absurdity and repulsiveness of growing a creature in your body and then raising it. It is a magnificent and satisfying meditation. One of the most honest and revelatory works of fiction about motherhood I have ever read. Ravn’s writing is ecstatic, philosophical, and addictive.” —Heather O’Neill, author of When We Lost Our Heads

OLGA RAVN is one of Denmark’s most celebrated contemporary authors. Her novel The Employees, translated by Martin Aitken, was nominated for numerous prizes, including the International Booker Prize and the inaugural Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction. Time Magazine named The Employees one of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2022. My Work won the Politiken Literature Prize in 2020. In collaboration with Danish publisher Gyldendal, she edited a selection of Tove Ditlevsen’s texts and books that relaunched Ditlevsen’s readership worldwide. She has also worked as a critic, teacher, and translator. Ravn lives in Copenhagen.

JENNIFER RUSSELL is a translator living in Copenhagen. She received an American-Scandinavian Foundation Award for her co-translation of Rakel Haslund-Gjerrild’s All the Birds in the Sky in 2020. With Sophia Hersi Smith, she has translated fiction and poetry by Danish writers such as Tove Ditlevsen, Olga Ravn, and Marianne Larsen. Their translations have appeared in The Paris Review, Granta, Asymptote, EuropeNow, Poetry International, and on stage.

SOPHIA HERSI SMITH is a translator living in Copenhagen. She received an American-Scandinavian Foundation Award for her co-translation of Rakel Haslund-Gjerrild’s All the Birds in the Sky in 2020. With Jennifer Russell, she has translated fiction and poetry by Danish writers such as Tove Ditlevsen, Olga Ravn, and Marianne Larsen. Their translations have appeared in The Paris Review, Granta, Asymptote, EuropeNow, Poetry International, and on stage.