Contemporary Romanian Poets: Denisa Comănescu in London

Poet in the City announced the first meeting from the project that is to bring Romanian contemporary poets in London this year. The first event in an exciting series of six poetry events held in collaboration with the Romanian Cultural Institute exploring contemporary Romanian culture through the eyes of its most accomplished poets, taking place in London between April and November 2011.

Denisa Comănescu, a poet, editor, and translator, was born in Romania in 1954. She is author of five volumes of poetry, including Banishment from Paradise which won the Romanian Writers Union Debut Prize in 1979, and has worked on an extended anthology of Romanian Women’s Poetry from 1960 to 2002. Reflecting the evocative landscapes and ghosts of people and relationships, Denisa’s poetry has been included in anthologies in more than fifteen countries. She will attend the meeting in London on 14th April 2011 at Romanian Cultural Institute (1 Belgrave Square).

This event will be hosted by Amanda Hopkinson, Reader at the School of Literature at the University of East Anglia, who will provide an English introduction and will place the poets in context for the English-speaking members of the audience. Poetry in Romanian will also be read and performed in English translation.
All events in the series will start promptly at 7.00pm.
This event is free but booking is essential!
RSVP
If you would like to see one or more of the events in Contemporary Romanian Poets series please RSVP
as soon as possible to the Romanian Cultural Institute:
Call 020 7752 0134
Email office@icr-london.co.uk
Or write to Contemporary Romanian Poets, Romanian
Cultural Institute, 1 Belgrave Square, London SW1X 8PH.
The other poets in the series are Claudiu Komartin, Bogdan Ghiu, Miruna Vlada, Andrei Bodiu and Vasile Gârneţ

Original Romanian Literature with a Contemporary Visual Edge

The University of Plymouth Press runs a project of publishing major Romanian from past century. The books look good, sound good, there is a good chance that they would be surprising.
You can already find the poems of Ioan Es Pop and those of Mircea Ivanescu, two of the most influent poets for the Romanian poetry after 2000 in Romania. Pop is published with No Way Out of Hadesburg and Other Poems translated by Adam J Sorkin and Lidia Vianu.

Like a huge, bitter seabird
misfortune hovers over the block of flats
at no.15 olteț street.

only those like us live in these rooms. no families. here
life gets wigged down, death forgotten.

and no one ever knows who or whom, who with
whom, when or what for.
sometimes the wind blows the smell of smoke and the tumult of battle
from the catalonian plain.
(...)

from No.15 Olteț Street, Room 305

Also, a very peculiar style of poetry can be found in Lines, Poems, Poetry, by Mircea Ivanescu, a poet that had been ignored even in Romania for about 30 years until he was re-descovered by the recent three generations of poets.
I add here a whole poem.

is poetry different?
you mustn't tell stories in poetry - i read
this advice to a young poet - so i won't tell
how she'd awaken very early in the morning and, sitting up in bed,
wait to catch her breath, her face hidden in her hands -
i won't say anything about her weary look
that made her shoulders droop before the mirror, when
slowly she combed her hair. i won't confess my fears
beside her estranged face, turned away from me.
i won't walk anywhere with my lines in my hands as if holding a mirror
to reflect those mornings with their pale grey light
moments before dawn. poetry - so it's written - mustn't
be representation, a succession of images. poetry
must be inward speech. thus, should i
be speaking again about her drowned face, her gasps
for breath? but that would be only my way of speaking
about her face, about her freeze-frame movements fixed
between layers of turbid regret, of thoughts solely mine,
about her image - it would be only a mask, an image -
while she - her true self, what about that?

Twenty of Romania's most influential and award-winning authors are launched by UPP in a new series 20 Romanian Writers. Romanian arts have long been unknown in the West and this series aims to make a lasting contribution to the canon of Eastern European literature.

These works have been translated into English for the first time; the collection captures Romania's rich cultural diversity and artistic heritage. Selected by an independent Romanian jury of editors, academics and publishers, the series showcases the most notable Romanian novels, essays, poetry, short prose and philosophy of the 20th and 21st centuries.

Each volume is edited and comes with a substantial introduction which contextualises the work not only within Romanian, but Eastern European and Anglo-American traditions. Texts are complemented with a 16 page full colour supplement provided by some of Romania's leading contemporary visual artists. 20 Romanian Writers is a landmark collection of the very best writing, which has come from Romania during the past 100 years. More info and all the titles chosen for the project at UPP page.

There are some other good books of prose and more poetry is announced to be launced soon in the collection. The prose includes a book by M.Blecher, who died in 1928, maybe the worst known of the most powefull writers that have ever written in Romanian.

Of Gentle Wolves: An Anthology of Romanian Poetry

Release Date: June 2011
Poetry | Translation

Translated by Martin Woodside

Amidst a history of upheaval, from Roman subjugation to the fall of communism in 1989, Romania’s fostered a persevering spirit and a strong poetic tradition. “Every Romanian is born a poet,” goes a popular idiom, and Of Gentle Wolves: An Anthology of Romanian Poetry aims to bring the very best of the country’s contemporary poets together in a single volume.

About the Translator: Martin Woodside’s poetry chapbook Stationary Landscapes came out in 2009 (Pudding House Press), and he spent 2009-10 on a Fulbright in Romania. He lives with his family in Philadelphia where he’s pursuing a PhD in Childhood Studies at Rutgers-Camden.
from Calypso editions

NY romanian Contemporary poetry walk

Romanian Poetry in New York Slideshow: Razvan’s trip from Bucharest, Romania to New York City, New York, United States was created by TripAdvisor. See another New York City slideshow. Create your own stunning slideshow with our free photo slideshow maker.

Romanian Poetry in Berlin, long night and relational poetics

Relational Poetics in 2009 And Long Romanian Poetry Night Slideshow: Razvan’s trip from Bucharest, Romania to Berlin, Germany was created by TripAdvisor. See another Berlin slideshow. Create your own stunning free slideshow from your travel photos.