Dallas, Tex.–based Deep Vellum Publishing is acquiring the assets of McLean, Ill.–based Dalkey Archive Press and will maintain the company as a distinct imprint, acquiring new titles as well as maintaining the press's backlist. Dalkey Archive will be run by Deep Vellum's publisher Will Evans, with the assistance of Chad W. Post of Open Letter Books, who will serve as editorial consultant.

The news comes in the wake of the passing of Dalkey Archive founder John O' Brien, who died on November 21 at age 75. The Dalkey Archive board had approved the merger shortly before O'Brien's death, and Will O’Brien, John’s son and current president of Dalkey Archive’s board of directors, will join Deep Vellum’s board as part of the merger.

"It's an honor to carry on John's legacy, to work with the amazing authors and translators he published, and to continue his legacy as a publisher and educator and carry forth his mission of serving readers," Will Evans, publisher of Deep Vellum Publishing, said.

Dalkey Archive was founded in Chicago in 1984, and has since became one of the world's leading publishers of translated literature, having published more than 1,000 books from 50 different languages, including works by winners of the Nobel Prize, National Book Award, and National Book Critics’ Circle Award. Among the many authors published by the press—which is named after the novel by Flann O'Brien—are Svetlana Alexievich, Anne Carson, Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Stanley Elkin, Carlos Fuentes, Danilo Kiš, Carole Maso, Jon Fosse, and Gertrude Stein.

O’Brien himself was awarded the Sandrof lifetime achievement award from the National Book Critics’ Circle in 2011. In 2015, he was appointed Chevalier in the Ordre des Arts & des Lettres in recognition of his significant contribution to French arts and literature by the Minister of Culture and Communication of France.

Disclosure: PW hosts Post's Translation Database on its website, and Post is a part-time contributor at PW; Ed Nawotka, PW's ​bookselling and international editor, is on Deep Vellum's board of directors.