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Contributor

Julian Semilian

Contributor

Julian Semilian

Julian Semilian is a poet, translator, novelist and filmmaker. He was born in Romania and currently teaches film editing at the North Carolina School of the Arts, after a twenty-four-year career as a film editor in Hollywood. His most recent translation is Paul Celan's Romanian Poems (Green Integer). His novel A Spy in Amnesia is out from Spuyten Duyvil. He is currently translating Mircea Cartarescu's Nostalgia for New Directions.

Articles by Julian Semilian

Beretta

By Mariana Marin

Chemical. / Fire grass. / Retching.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

Mynheer

By Mariana Marin

Good man, my friend Mynheer . . . / Banished one day far from home

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

L’apparition

By Mariana Marin

And the redeeming hour in which the poem writhes; / and the young desert in the still glowing cinders;

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

Red and White

By Mariana Marin

At times reality catches me in the middle of the act / and stuffs down my throat its five-cornered red stars.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

A Friend of the Archangel

By Gabriela Melinescu

As shadows turn to light, so was Gabriel's sadness turning constantly into something else.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

The Karenina Complex

By Mariana Marin

If only I knew how to lose my shadow on time / if only I knew how to point myself out with my finger,

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

To Live in Sin

The chief was about to run after him and give him a beating, but Lia stood in his way and said: He's underage.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

Nabokov in Brasov

By Mircea Cartarescu

I was asked to join Securitate.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian

From “The Roulette Player”

By Mircea Cartarescu

The roulette with three bullets greased inside the chamber fuses in my mind with the events that followed.

Translated from Romanian by Julian Semilian