January Translations: Poetry

Finding poetry in translation is probably more difficult than finding works of fiction, so again, this is probably missing a few things, but here goes:

• Contemporary Russian Poetry: An Anthology, edited by Evgeny Bunimovich and J. Kates, translated by various (Dalkey Archive, $14.95, 9781564784865)

This book came out of the NEA International Literary Exchanges program and is a wide-ranging collection of contemporary Russian poetry translated by a variety of people, both established and up-and-coming. I actually wrote the grant for this, and if all goes according to plan, this collection should be getting a lot of attention over the next few months.

• Looking for Horse Latitudes, Miguel Gonzalez-Gerth, translated from the Spanish by the author (Host Publications, $15.00, 9780924047480)

From the Host website: “Looking for the Horse Latitudes is a stunning poetry collection from esteemed poet and translator Miguel Gonzalez-Gerth. Describing this bilingual volume as “a laboratory in which a very interesting experiment has been carried out,” Gonzalez-Gerth writes in both Spanish and English and moves deftly between the two languages, creating a voice both cosmopolitan and intensely Latin American.”

• Nettles, Venus Khoury-Ghata, translated from the French by Marilyn Hacker (Graywolf, $14.00, 9781555974879)

The last collection from Lebanese poet Venus Khoury-Ghata was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award, and I’m sure this will receive a ton of praise as well. The Graywolf website describes it as such: “In Nettles, Vénus Khoury-Ghata brings her impulses for lyric poetry and for stark narrative together into four enchanting sequences. Each confronts the realities of womanhood, immigration, and cultural conflict with an imagination and history born from both the Arabic and French languages.” And an excerpt is available here.