Christine De Luca reads ‘Dis life is nivver enyoch’ – in Shetlandic
Christine De Luca reads ‘Dis life is nivver enyoch’ – in Shetlandic by Modern Poetry in Translation Magazine
Mar 31, 2019•5 min
Modern Poetry in Translation
When Ted Hughes and Daniel Weissbort founded MPT in 1965 they had two principal ambitions: to get poetry out from behind the Iron Curtain into a wider circulation in English and to benefit writers and the reading public in Britain and America by confronting them with good work from abroad. They published poetry that dealt truthfully with the real contemporary world. For more than 50 years MPT has continued and widened that founding intent.
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Episodes
Gerda Stevenson reads ‘I am the Airt’ – in Scots
Gerda Stevenson reads ‘I am the Airt’ – in Scots From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•5 min
Liz Berry reads ‘Iron Oss’ – Black Country Dialect
Liz Berry reads ‘Iron Oss’ – in Black Country Dialect From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•4 min
Jhilmil Breckenridge reads ‘वेनलॉक एज पर वन मुशकिल मे है’ – a Hindi translation of AE Housman
Jhilmil Breckenridge reads ‘वेनलॉक एज पर वन मुशकिल मे है’ – a Hindi translation of AE Housman – from the online translation workshop
Mar 31, 2019•2 min
Philip Gross and Cyril Jones read a series of englyn translations – in English and Welsh
Philip Gross and Cyril Jones read a series of englyn translations – in English and Welsh From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•8 min
Mukur Petrolwala reads ‘રાખ (Ash)’ – a Gujarati translation of AE Housman
Mukur Petrolwala reads ‘રાખ (Ash)’ – a Gujarati translation of AE Housman from the MPT online translation workshop
Mar 31, 2019•3 min
David Morley reads ‘Roma and Roma’ – a Romani tranlsation of AE Housman
David Morley reads ‘Roma and Roma’ – a Romani tranlsation of AE Housman from the MPT online translation workshop
Mar 31, 2019•2 min
Steve Dornan reads a version of Vahabzade’s ‘Knock the Fences Down’ – translated into Ulster Scots
Steve Dornan reads a version of Vahabzade’s ‘Knock the Fences Down’ – translated into Ulster Scots From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•4 min
Anna Kessling reads ‘SW16 1961’ – a Streatham dialect translation of AE Housman
Anna Kessling reads ‘SW16 1961’ – a Streatham dialect translation of AE Housman from the MPT online translation workshop
Mar 31, 2019•1 min
Sophie Herxheimer reads ‘On ze Kvestion off a ‘Hostile Infyroment’ – in Inklisch
Sophie Herxheimer reads ‘On ze Kvestion off a ‘Hostile Infyroment’ – in Inklisch From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•4 min
Tim Saunders reads ‘Porthpean’ – in English and Cornish
Tim Saunders reads ‘Porthpean’ – in English and Cornish From MPT 'Our Small Universe: Focus on Languages of the United Kingdom', Spring 2019 See more at wwwmodernpoetryintranslation.com
Mar 31, 2019•3 min
HOW TO SWIM: Introducing our digital pamphlet on Lithuanian poetry
In this episode, MPT Editor Clare Pollard introduces our Digital Pamphlet on Lithuanian poetry, 'How to Swim', and looks back at our online translation workshop on Lithuanian poetry. Hear Martyn Crucefix reading his tranlsation of *** by Nijolė Miliauskaitė, alongside a reading in the original Lithuanian. This digital pamphlet is published on 21 February 2018. See more at: modernpoetryintranslation.com/how-to-swim/
Feb 20, 2019•6 min
Words about Words: Introducing MPT's Digital Latvian Poetry Pamphlet
IN this episode, MPT Editor Clare Pollard introduces our Digital Pamphlet on Latvian poetry, 'Words about Words', and looks back at our online translation workshop on Latvian poetry. See more at: http://modernpoetryintranslation.com/words-about-words/
Oct 23, 2018•7 min
silencesilencesilencesilencesilencesilence: On Estonian poetry and our online translation workshop
IN this episode, MPT Editor Clare Pollard introduces our Digital Pamphlet on Estonian poetry, silencesilencesilencesilencesilencesilence, and looks back at our online translation workshop on Estonian poetry. See more: http://modernpoetryintranslation.com/estonian-poetry-digital-pamphlet-silencesilencesilencesilencesilencesilence/
Aug 07, 2018•12 min
"In Spite of Everything": Annie Freud reading her translation of Jacques Tornay
Introduction to Jacques Tornay by Annie Freud, published in MPT 'Profound Pyromania'. I met Jacques Tornay in 2016 at HeadRead, the International Literary Festival of Estonia. Sitting in the audience, listening to poems in many languages which are foreign to me, I was suddenly transported by the familiar sounds of the French language. Having been brought up on the poems of Ronsard, Du Bellay, Lamartine and de Regnier, I had the sensation of inhabiting that part of myself that breathes, hears and...
Jun 13, 2018•6 min
The Struggle: a reading and discussion with Hisham Bustani and translator Thoraya El-Rayyes
From the introduction to Hisham Bustani's poems in MPT 'A Blossom Shroud' by translator Thoraya El-Rayyes: Few poems better capture the cynicism of the infamously irate Hisham Bustani than these two odes to frustration. A poet, short-story writer, political commentator and veteran rabble rouser, Bustani’s eventful public life has been punctuated by various brushes with the police state – from harassment by the censors and security services, to arrests for his writing and involvement in political...
May 04, 2018•9 min
War Of the Beasts And The Animals - Read by the poet Maria Stepanova and translator, Sasha Dugdale
Russian poet Maria Stepanova wrote her epic poem ‘War of the Beasts and the Animals’ in 2015, when the war in the Donbas Region of Ukraine was at its height. Every line in this densely-populated and highly allusive poem emerges from a consciousness of conflict and the martial culture and mythology that allows state-sponsored violence to happen. Stepanova traces the mythmaking culture of war from ballads and films of the Russian Civil War through the Second World War and into the twenty-first cen...
Jan 20, 2018•30 min
Mona Kareem: The Room of Darkness
ABOUT THE POET: MONA KAREEM Mona Kareem is a poet-writer-translator based in New York. She is the author of three poetry collections. Her translations include Ashraf Fayadh's Instructions Within and an Arabic selection of Alejandra Pizarnik’s poems. ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR: ROBIN MOGER: Robin Moger is a freelance translator of Arabic with a particular interest in twentieth-century and contemporary prose and poetry
Oct 02, 2017•9 min
Sumerian Tablets as 'Iraqi Haiku' - Dunya Mikhail reads 'Tablets III' and talks about her work
DUNYA MIKHAIL was born in Iraq and left for the United States in 1996. Her books include The Iraqi Nights, Diary of A Wave Outside the Sea, and The War Works Hard. She also edited a pamphlet of Iraqi poetry titled 15 Iraqi Poets. She was awarded the Kresge Fellowship, Arab American Book Award, and UN Human Rights Award for Freedom of Writing.
Aug 14, 2017•11 min
Translation Duel at Ledbury Poetry Festival! Olivia McCannon vs Susan Wicks
Two poet-translators rattle their sabres for a duel of words and French poetry! Listen to MPT's translation duel which took place at Ledbury Poetry Festival, Sunday 9 July 2017. Olivia McCannon and Susan Wicks went head-to-head with their translations of a poem by Ariane Dreyfus. *No poets were harmed in the production of this event*. About the translators: Olivia McCannon is a translator of Balzac and winner of the Jerwood Aldeburgh First Collection Prize. Susan Wicks’ translations of Valérie R...
Jul 16, 2017•52 min
Two poems by Ján Gavura, read by the poet and translator James Sutherland-Smith
In Gavura’s work the poetic persona has a strong empathy with nature, seeing it as an example of both a non-human otherness and as part of God’s creation. As a theologian Gavura regards nature and humanity as part of a post-lapsarian existence. Gavura’s natural world and the animals which inhabit it are true to themselves and the savagery they express is an aspect of the innocence they retain. His poems draw on everyday feelings of doubt, fear, disillusionment, anger, weakness or even evil thoug...
Jul 16, 2017•15 min
Siddhartha Bose: ‘Elegy, Father’s City’
ABOUT SIDDHARTHA BOSE I was born in Calcutta and spent the first five years of my life there. This city, which was once the second city of the British Empire, was where English literature was fi rst introduced as a discipline of study, to civilise the natives. I spent the next eight years in Bombay, and returned to the city of my birth for another five before moving to the USA on my own when I was eighteen. After seven years in America, I moved to London in 2005 on a British government scholarsh...
Jun 09, 2017•10 min
Two poems by Han Kang: read by Han Kang and translator Sophie Bowman
This podcast includes readings of two poems by award-winning Korean author Han Kang, 'Pitch-Black house of Light' and 'Winter Through a Mirror'. SOPHIE BOWMAN is a literary translator and student of Korean literature. She won the 2015 Korea Times Translation Award for her translation of poems by Jin Eun-young and her prose translations can be found in Koreana magazine. HAN KANG is a novelist, poet, and a professor of creative writing at Seoul Institute of the Arts. She received the 2016 Man Book...
May 02, 2017•13 min
Denise Riley and Don Mee Choi read at the launch of MPT The Blue Vein
In this podcast: 00:00 - Introduction to Denise Riley 02:50 - Denise Riley reading begins 33.05 - Sasha Dugdale introduces Don Mee Choi 42.12 - Don Mee Choi reads translations of Kim Hyesoon 54:00 - Don Mee Choi reads translations of Kim Yideum 1:05:48 - Don Mee Choi reads from her book ‘The Morning News is Exciting’ This podcast features Denise Riley and Don Mee Choi. It was recorded at The Print Room, London, for the launch of Modern Poetry in Translation's winter issue 'The Blue Vein', which ...
Apr 03, 2017•1 hr 18 min
The Memory of Now: read by Geet Chaturvedi and Anita Gopalan
With a career spanning over two decades and six books to his credit, Geet Chaturvedi is one of the most widely read contemporary Hindi authors. His poetry delights the reader with its inner lyrical beauty and playfulness, as well as its sensitivity and sensibility of ideas and imagination. This recording is read by the author, and translator Anita Gopalan.
Oct 18, 2016•4 min
European Voices: with Tara Bergin, Jane Draycott, Jan Wagner and Iain Galbraith
Three distinguished poets with international perspectives read their work at Winchester Poetry Festival 2016. Hear new poems by Jan Wagner in Iain Galbraith’s prizewinning translations and a new long poem by Jane Draycott which was written in response to the Dutch modernist poem ‘Awater’. Tara Bergin’s reading includes the response poem she wrote for MPT’s new first issue website, ‘Bachmann’s Warbler’.
Oct 09, 2016•1 hr 1 min
Greetings to the People of Europe! Alemu Tebeje and Chris Beckett
ALEMU TEBEJE is an Ethiopian journalist, poet and web-campaigner based in London. His poems have been published in the anthologies Forever Spoken and No Serenity Here, featuring 26 poets from 12 African countries. His website is: www.debteraw.com * CHRIS BECKETT grew up in Ethiopia and his translations of contemporary Amharic poets such as Bewketu Seyoum and Zewdu Milikit have appeared in MPT, Poetry Review and Wasafiri. His collection of praise shouts and laments, Ethiopia Boy, was published by...
Aug 07, 2016•3 min
One Night I Will Return to My Birthplace: Read by the poet, Majid Naficy, and Elizabeth T Gray Jr
MAJID NAFICY Majid Naficy was born in Isfahan, Iran, in 1952 and currently lives in West Los Angeles, California. Raised in a large and well- educated family, his first poems were published in a literary journal in Isfahan when he was just 13. After studying at the University of California at Los Angeles, Naficy returned to Tehran University, abandoned writing poetry, and joined political groups working to overthrow the Shah. After the 1979 Revolution, when Khomeini began to crack down on dissid...
Jul 15, 2016•4 min
The Voronezh Variations: seven translations of an Osip Mandelstam quatrain, by George Szirtes
George Szirtes was born in Budapest in 1948, and came to England with his family after the 1956 Hungarian Uprising. He was educated in England, training as a painter, and has always written in English. In recent years he has worked as a translator of Hungarian literature, producing editions of such writers as Ottó Orbán, Zsuzsa Rakovszky and Ágnes Nemes Nagy. He co-edited Bloodaxe’s Hungarian anthology The Colonnade of Teeth. His Bloodaxe poetry books are The Budapest File (2000); An English Apo...
Jun 28, 2016•6 min
'In Lampedusa' by Ribka Sibhatu: read by Niyat Remedy Asfaha, translated by André Naffis-Sahely
This poem is published in MPT ‘The Great Flight’ focusses on refugee poetry – poetry by refugees and about the plight of refugees and migrants. Read more: http://bit.ly/1r8dsmK This issue introduces us to a range of new work by renowned poets, including Eritrean Ribka Sibhatu and Ethiopian Hama Tuma. South Korean poet and translator Don Mee Choi writes about her experiences of migration and we’ve commissioned a new translation of important work by Syrian poet Golan Haji. Carmen Bugan writes movi...
Jun 05, 2016•6 min
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