Events

Virtual Poetry Readings by the Amherst Center for Russian Culture:

Polina Barskova was born in then Leningrad in 1976. She published her first book of poetry “Christmas” in 1991, -- last year her tenth book of poetry “A Sunny Morning in the Square” has been published in Saint Petersburg. Barskova left Russia at the age of twenty to pursue a Ph.D. in Russian Studies at UC Berkeley, having already earned a graduate degree and become an accomplished poet in her homeland. Three books of Barskova’s poetry were translated into English This Lamentable City (Tupelo Press, 2010), The Zoo in Winter: Selected Poems (Melville House, 2011), and Relocations (Zephyr Press, 2015). As a professor of Russian literature at Hampshire College, Barskova began an archival project that resulted in Written in the Dark: Five Poets in the Siege of Leningrad (Ugly Duckling Press).

Eugene Ostashevsky is a Russian-American poet working in English. His latest book of poetry, The Pirate Who Does Not Know the Value of PI (NYRB, 2017), was translated into German by Uljana Wolf and Monika Rinck and won the International Poetry Prize of the City of Münster. It was also made into a short opera for the Venice Biennale by Lucia Ronchetti. His translation of the Russian avant-garde poet Alexander Vvedensky won the National Translation Award.

Virtual Poetry Readings by the Amherst Center for Russian Culture:

Maria Stepanova is a poet, essayist, and journalist. She is the author of ten poetry collections and three books of essays, and a recipient of several Russian and international literary awards, including the prestigious Andrey Bely Prize and Joseph Brodsky Foundation Fellowship. Her poems have been translated into many languages, including English, Italian, German, French, and Hebrew. Her novel Pamiati pamiati (In Memory of Memory) that blends memoir, documents, and essays into an epic narrative, came out in Russian in November 2017 and received the Big Book Prize in December 2018 and NOS prize in February 2019.

Linor Goralik (b. 1975) is a poet, writer, artist, author of several collections of poems and short fiction, novels, and books for children. She is a founder and chief editor of the Post Media project. Linor is a fellow of the Joseph Brodsky Memorial Fund. She lives in Tel Aviv.

Virtual Poetry Readings by the Amherst Center for Russian Culture:

Oksana Vasyakina is a poet, an essayist, and a feminist. She lives and works in Moscow where she teaches contemporary writing at the High School of Economics. Her first book "Women's Prose" was published in 2016, the second, "Fierce Wind" in 2019. Her works are translated into English and Italian.

Igor Bulatovsky is a poet, literary critic, translator from Yiddish and French, publisher. He authored 10 books of poetry. Bulatovsky received Joseph Brodsky Foundation Prize for poetry and was shortlisted for Andrey Bely Prize. Lives in Saint Petersburg.

Virtual Poetry Readings by the Amherst Center for Russian Culture:

Anna Glazova is a poet, translator, and independent scholar. She has published five books of poetry in Russian language and has been awarded the Andrey Bely Prize for her book "For a Shrew." She received her Ph.D. in German and Comparative Literature from Northwestern University (USA). She translates from German and English; among the translated authors are Paul Celan, Franz Kafka, Unica Zürn, Walter Benjamin, and Emily Dickinson.

Aleksandr Skidan was born in Leningrad in 1965. Poet, critic, translator. Author of five collections of poetry and several books of essays, including the most recent “Syr bukv mel. On Arkadii Dragomoschenko” (2019). He translated poetry and fiction (Paul Bowles, Charles Olson, Susan Howe, Rosmarie Waldrop, Michael Palmer), as well as art-criticism and theoretical works of Paul de Man, J. Hillis Miller, Jean-Luc Nancy, Daniel Birnbaum, Paolo Virno, Gerald Raunig. Winner of Andrey Bely Prize in poetry for the collection “Red Shifting” (2006). Joseph Brodsky Memorial Fund fellowship (2018). His poetry is translated into many languages and published in numerous anthologies. In 2008 his book “Red Shifting” was published in USA by Ugly Duckling Presse. Member of Chto Delat? group, Skidan participates in different artistic and activist projects. Co-editor of the “New Literary Observer” magazine (Moscow). He lives in Saint-Petersburg.