Poet Ribka Sibhatu and translator André Naffis-Sahely have worked closely together for over 10 years, translating her poetry to bring it to the attention of English speaking audiences. Manchester Poetry Library and the PTC are delighted to celebrate the publication of Aulò! Aulò! Aulò! selected poems and Fables with a special reading and a wider discussion about Italian and Eritrean poetry with both poet and translator. Sibhatu writes in Tigrinya and Italian, and her poetry reflects on the immigrant experience in Europe. Her 2009 collection Aulò offers a remarkable personal achievement in giving lyric expression to the Eritrean oral poetic tradition.

Biographies

Ribka Sibhatu regularly works with students teaching them about the aural traditions of African storytelling, and was part of the Cultural Olympiad for London 2012, representing Eritrea at the global literary meeting Poetry Parnassus at the Southbank Centre. Alongside writing and keeping her cultural traditions alive, Sibhatu is a passionate campaigner for the rights of refugees.

André Naffis-Sahely is the author of the collection The Promised Land: Poems from Itinerant Life (Penguin, 2017) and the pamphlet The Other Side of Nowhere (Rough Trade Books, 2019). He is also the editor of The Heart of a Stranger: An Anthology of Exile Literature (Pushkin Press, 2020). He is from Abu Dhabi, but was born in Venice to an Iranian father and an Italian mother. He has translated over twenty titles of fiction, poetry and nonfiction, including works by Honoré de Balzac, Émile Zola, Abdellatif Laâbi, Tahar Ben Jelloun and Frankétienne.

Manchester Metropolitan University is committed to disability equality. If you have any access requirements, please let us know by emailing lucy.simpson@mmu.ac.uk before you attend to help us to make sure that your visit to the event is as enjoyable as possible.

Ribka Sibhatu's tour has been co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union.