To celebrate National Poetry Month, on Wednesday, April 27, Words Without Borders and Poets House present an evening with three poet-translators featured in the April issue of WWB. Flávia Rocha and Idra Novey will read in Portuguese and English, and Melcion Mateu will read in Catalan. The reading will be followed by a discussion led by Catalan and Spanish translator Mary Ann Newman. The event is free and open to the public (please register here).
A co-presentation of Poets House and Words Without Borders.
Date: Wednesday, April 27, 7:00pm
Location: Poets House – Kray Hall, 10 River Terrace, New York, NY 10282
Participants:
Idra Novey is the author of the novel Ways to Disappear, a New York Times Editors' Choice. Her fiction and poetry have been translated into eight languages and she's written for The Paris Review, the New York Times, and NPR's All Things Considered. Her most recent translation is Clarice Lispector's novel The Passion According to G.H.
Flávia Rocha is a Brazilian poet, editor, and journalist. She is the author of three books of poetry: A Casa Azul ao Meio-dia (2005), Quartos Habitáveis (2011), and Um País (2015), all published in Brazil. She holds an MFA in Writing from Columbia University, and for thirteen years was an editor and then the editor-in-chief for Rattapallax, a literary magazine featuring contemporary American and international poetry. She cowrote the screenplay of Birds of Neptune, an independent feature film by Steven Richter.
Melcion Mateu is the author of four books of poetry, among them Vida evident, which won the 1998 Octavio Paz Prize, and Illes lligades, which was awarded the 2014 Jocs Florals de Barcelona Prize. Mateu has translated into Catalan works by John Ashbery, Siri Hustvedt, and Michael Ondaatje, among others. He holds an MA in comparative literature from Cornell University and a PhD in Spanish and Portuguese from New York University. He is currently a professor at the Univesidade Federal do Paraná in Curitiba, Brazil.
Mary Ann Newman translates from Catalan and Spanish. She has published short stories and a novel by Quim Monzó, non-fiction by Xavier Rubert de Ventós, and poetry by Josep Carner. Her most recent translation is Private Life (Archipelago Books), a 1932 Catalan classic by Josep Maria de Sagarra. In 1998 she was awarded the Creu de Sant Jordi, and she is currently the Executive Director of the Farragut Fund for Catalan Culture in the U.S.
Read the feature, with work by the featured poet-translators and Rowan Ricardo Phillips, in our April issue, and register here for the event.
