Articles

01/07/2009

Introduction to Isthmus Zapotec

by David Shook

This article gives a brief introduction to Isthmus Zapotec, the indigenous Mexican language spoken in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico.

13/03/2008

'Singing About the Dark Times': Poetry and Conflict

by Sarah Maguire

Sarah Maguire argues that 'translating poetry is the opposite of war' in the keynote lecture that she was invited to give at the StAnza Festival in 2008.

19/07/2009

Translating Corsino Fortes

by Daniel Hahn

Prize-winning translator, Daniel Hahn, writes about how he approached translating Corsino Fortes's poems with Sean O'Brien. This was Daniel's first experience of translating poetry, and his first as a co-translator and he's very interesting on how he felt his role was to 'defend' the original poems.

07/01/2009

Translating Farzaneh Khojandi

by Jo Shapcott

Jo Shapcott enthuses about the 'magic' of translating Farzaneh Khojandi with Narguess Farzad. She talks about the 'daunting' challenges she faced coming to terms with a poet whose work 'seemed worlds away from the modern, urban context of my own work'.

24/08/2009

Some Thoughts on Co-Translating Gaarriye

by W N Herbert

W N Herbert offers a fascinating insight into how he approached co-translating Somali poetry. In this essay he describes his induction into the marvellous complexities of Somali verse and how he came to terms with the formal dexterities of Gaarriye's 'non-lyric' poetry.

15/07/2008

Translating Noshi Gillani

by Lavinia Greenlaw

Lavinia Greenlaw writes about the impact that listening to Noshi Gillani read her poems had on her translations: 'I had in my head Emily Dickinson's dashes - how they hold the parts of her poems in mid-air, or the artist Cornelia Parker's suspended cutlery and blown-up shed.'

16/10/2006

'There is a Sudanese Culture'

by Richard Lea

This is an interview Saddiq gave to Richard Lea of Guardian Online during his Autumn Tour in 2006. 'In the face of Sudan's long conflict between the supposedly Arabic north and African south, Al-Saddiq Al-Raddi's poetry blends influences from both. Richard Lea meets him.'

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