Barbara Wright was one of the foremost British translators of modern French literature. Her versions of works of Alfred Jarry, Raymond Queneau, Marguerite Duras, Jean Genet, Eugène Ionesco, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Nathalie Sarraute, Robert Pinget, Michel Tournier and many others did much to introduce contemporary French writing to the English-speaking world.

Barbara Winifred Wright was born in Worthing, West Sussex, educated locally, and went to study music under Alfred Cortot in Paris. There she began to accumulate her exceptional knowledge and understanding of contemporary and colloquial French language, life and literature. She returned to London as an accompanist, giving several recitals at the Wigmore Hall.

She met her future husband, Walter Hubbard, who was a specialist printer (of Channel Island and Indian bank notes, for instance) and they married in 1938, living in St John’s Wood.

After their separation in 1957 she went to live in Frognal, Hampstead, where her literary career was largely played out. Her house became a point of convivial welcome for writers and artists of all nationalities. She was always as alert to promoting the creative ventures of others as to expanding her own talents and interests.

At the beginning of the war she had worked with Dora Russell, as a teacher in her school. She entered the world of books through her encounter around 1947 with Franciszka and Stefan Themerson, who were about to found their Gaberbocchus Press, of which she became a director. She collaborated on an English edition of one of their Polish books for children, and then became a translator almost by chance, when they invited her to take on a first English edition of Jarry’s Ubu Roi (1951). The book became a flagship for the press, its text handwritten by her — like Franciszka’s drawn illustrations — directly on to the lithographic plates, and printed on loud yellow paper. The translation fluently conveys Jarry’s mingling of Shakespearian parody with schoolboy smut, and — unlike some renderings — is both funny and readily performable.

This success was followed by her brilliant translation of the “untranslatable” Exercices de style by Queneau (1956). Both were acclaimed as modern classics, as in 1960 was her rendering of Queneau’s Zazie dans le Métro (1960). And all have often been reprinted. These achievements launched Wright on a distinguished career as a translator that has included the work, plays and essays, as well as novels, of Albert-Birot, Arrabal, Beckett, Duras, Genet, Ionesco, Pinget, Robbe-Grillet, Sarraute, Tournier and Tzara among others.

Wright worked closely with Queneau from the outset, ended by translating most of his novels, and — as with Sarraute, Pinget and others — became a close friend.

All her translation was marked by a blend of precision and imagination. Queneau delightedly endorsed her improvised invention of English versions for those among the Exercices that proved immune to translation. After reading her translation of Queneau’s Pierrot Mon Ami, John Updike (obituary, January 28, 2009) wrote in the New Yorker that she “has waltzed around the floor with the Master so many times by now that she follows his quirky French as if the steps were in English”.

Wright made a distinctive contribution to the understanding of the “New French Novel” in the English-speaking world, and helped to build a valuable link between writers, artists and the academic community. She also wrote literary and art criticism, displaying the same sense of humour, fun, tolerance, understanding and the absurd as shines through her translations, and helps explain her popularity among those she worked with.

The great distinction of her work was recognised by the award, not once but twice, of the Scott Moncrieff prize — in 1987 for her translation of Pierre Albert-Birot’s Grabinoulor, and in 1992 for The Midnight Love Feast by Michel Tournier.

Her work on Jarry, Queneau, Arrabal and others was acclaimed by the Collège de Pataphysique in France, and she was elected first to be a “Regent of Shakespearian Zozology” (1953) and later elevated to be a Satrape (2001) alongside Umberto Eco, Dario Fo and Jean Baudrillard. She was a member of the Association des Traducteurs Littéraires de France, and in 2002 she was appointed Commandeur dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres for her contribution to French literature.

Wright’s literary archive is lodged with the Lilly Library, Indiana, and further material is in the Themerson Archive, London.

She was still working until her last days, still completing The Times crossword before breakfast each day. Her culture was wide, and she was averse to pretension in any form. She continued to play the piano for pleasure.

For many years she celebrated New Year’s Eve by taking part in a fourhanded recital of the Danse Macabre. In 2000 she accompanied a performance of Jarry’s Song of the

Disembraining for a centenary celebration of Ubu at the Institut Français in London.

To the end, she gratified her enthusiasm for the detective stories of Rex Stout and Fred Vargas.

Wright is survived by her daughter and her stepson.

Barbara Wright, translator, was born on October 13, 1915. She died on March 3, 2009, aged 93