Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022
Focus: Balkan Languages

September 15 - 18 | September 23 - 25 | September 29 - October 2 2022

                                                                                                'Useful and inspiring!'
                                                                                               'Exceptional holiday in my translator's calendar'
                                                                                                (shared by participants in the Studio in 2021) 

The fourth edition of the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation is a non-academic training aimed at literary translators working into Bulgarian in their early or middle stage of professional development.

The Studio provides a rich programme of practical sessions, lectures, discussions and networking events that will improve the participants' skills, revealing successful strategies from behind the scenes of translation, editing, pitching to publishers and grant programmes. The workshops are designed to encourage collaboration and peer learning, since the participants’ own translations are the main focus of the Studio’s small-group discussions. 

For the first time this year, within the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022, the international Balkan Studio for Literary Translation ViceVersa took place, aimed at literary translators from Bulgaria and the Western Balkan countires working from Bulgarian into the languages of the Western Balkan countires and vice versa. 

Curator of the programme of the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022 is Nadezhda Radulova.

Photos from the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022:

Mentors of the Multiligual Workshops in the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022: 

Vladimir Molev
Vladimir Molev is an awarded literary translator from English. Among the authors he has translated are Kazuo Ishiguro, Jonathan Franzen, Sebastian Bari, Richard Flanagan.



Maria Zmiicharova
Maria Zmiicharova stated translating movie and TV subtitles and continued with poetry and prose translation from English, Swedish, Dutch and Norwegian. She has translated William Shakespeare, Carsten Jensen, Peter Shaffer, Tomas Tranströmer, among others.





Photo credit: Iliyan Ruzhin

Stella Djelepova
Stella Djelepova is an awarded literary translator from Swedish, Norwegian and English. She has brough to the Bulgarian audience titles by J. R. R. Tolkien, Henrik Insen, Per Pettershon.





Milena Popova
Milena Popova is an awarded translator of novels, short stories, plays, as well as philosophical, literary, political and art studies texts. Among the authors translated by her are Truman Capote, E.L. Doctorow, Jeffrey Eugenides, Jeffrey Moore.



 

Lectors in the Autumn Studio for Literary Translation 2022: 

Ekaterina Petrova
Ekaterina Petrova received her literary translation MA diploma from Iowa Univery. She has translated to English Bulgarian authors as Bogdan Rusev and Yana Bukova. Ekaterina also writes travelogues, essays and articles.



Photo credit: Yana Lozeva

Maria Vassileva
Maria Vassileva is a poet and translator from English and Russian and has studied Comparative Literature and Modern Russian Literature (PhD) at Harvard University. Two poetry books of hers have been published in Bulgaria, as well as translations of contemporary Bulgarian and Russian poetry in renowned English language issues.







Pavlina Varbanova
Pavlina Varbanova has studied Bulgarian philology and obtained her PhD in Bulgarian language. She is the author of the first Bulgarian online platform for language literacy “Как се пише?”, as well of Bulgarian language textbooks and handbooks.






Photo credit: Svetla Encheva

Teodora Tsankova
Teodora Tsankova has a PhD on Western European literature, works at the Department of Spanish and Portuguese Studies at Sofia University and is Vice-President of the Union of Translators in Bulgaria. Among the authors she has translated from Spanish are Javier Marías, H.L. Borges, Enrique Villa-Matas, José Ignacio Torreblanca.

Mentors in the Balkan Studio for Literary Translation ViceVersa:

Ksenija Banović
Ksenija Banović has been engaged in literary translation since 2005. Her translations in Croatian of over thirty Bulgarian writers have been awarded and widely published, including works of authors such as Georgi Gospodinov, Alek Popov, Zachary Karabashliev, Vladimir Zarev, Vera Mutafchieva.


Photo credit: Goran Fuzul

Nikola Madzhirov
Nikola Madzhirov is a North Macedonian poet, essayist and translator from Croatian, Serbian, Bosnian, Bulgarian and English, whose poems have been translated into more than 40 languages. Among authors translated by him are Louise Glück, Li-Young Lee, Faruk Šehić. He is the first translator of Georgi Gospodinov into Macedonian and also brought to Macedonian readers poetry by Silvia Choleva, Ekaterina Yosifova, Mirela Ivanova, Boyko Lambovski, Nikolay Boykov.

Photo credit: Civitella Ranieri

Rusana Hristova-Bejleri
Rusana Hristova-Bejleri, PhD, is an Assoc. Prof. of Albanian Language and Literature at the Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski. She is a scholar, interpreter and literary translator, co-author of Balkan Idioms Dictionary and Stefan Çapaliku’s novel ‘Each one gets crazy in their own way’ (Sofia, Ergo, 2022).









Photo credit: Elion Misini

Rusanka Lyapova
Rusanka Lyapova believes that all true things pass through the heart, sharing her love for words between translating and teaching. She has translated over 40 books from South Slavic languages -Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Macedonian, mostly by contemporary authors, including mainly prose and less often poetry and drama. She currently teaches at the Military Academy in Sofia.
 

Lectors in the Balkan Studio for Literary Translation ViceVersa:

Аmelia Licheva
Amelia Licheva is a poet and literary critic, professor of literary theory at Sofia University. She has authored numerous theoretical books and poetry collections. Her poems have been translated into English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Polish, Slovak, Croatian, Hungarian, Arabic. Editor-in-Chief of Literary Journal and member of the Bulgarian PEN Center.

Bilyana Kurtasheva
Bilyana Kurtasheva holds a PhD in Theory and history of literature and works at New Bulgarian University. She studied Bulgarian philology and authored the books "On the edge of comparison. Yavorov and the Rolling Stones and other non/possible intertexts" (2018, nomination for the national award "Hristo G. Danov") and "Anthologies and canon: anthological models of Bulgarian literature" (2012, National award "South Spring" for literary history and criticism). Co-founder and editor of the independent literary magazine "Vitamin B" (1996-1999). As a researcher, she worked on her own projects at CAS, Sofia, and IWM, Vienna.


Daria Karapetkova
Daria Karapetkova is associate professor at Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski", lecturer in the specialty "Italian Philology", translator from the Italian language and literary critic. She teaches theory, practice and reception of translation, as well as disciplines related to the development and problems of the modern Italian language. She leads the Italian module in the Master's programme "Translator-Editor". Her interests are in the field of translation theory and practice. She is the author of monographs and books on translation. She is member of the Translators' Union and the Expert Council of the National Book Center and recipient of the "Star of Italy" order for special merits in the development of bilateral relations and the promotion of Italian culture around the world.


Elena Alexieva
Elena Alexieva writes poetry and fiction. Her first collection of short stories "Reading Group 31" (2005) won the prestigious "Helikon" award for contemporary Bulgarian fiction. Her works have been published in periodicals and anthologies in English, French, Polish and Spanish. Her novel "Who" was published in Spain, followed by "The Knight, the Devil and Death" in Serbia and "Nobel Laureate" in France. Elena Alexieva is also the author of numerous plays staged in several Bulgarian theatres. The 2018 novel “Holy Wolf” and her latest collection of short stories “The Interruption of Samsara” have won numerous awards. She works as a freelance translator and writer.



Photo credit: снимка: Pavel Chervenkov

Manol Peykov
Manol Peykov is the owner and manager of the iconic Janet 45 publishing house. He translates poetry and prose, he is the winner of the "Plovdiv" award for artistic translation, the special award of the Union of Translators in Bulgaria (2015) and the national award "Hristo G. Danov" (2016).


 

Lectors in the online shared sessions:

Vessela Elenkova
Vessela Elenkova studied English philology and public administration and is currently an assistant in literature teaching methodology at the Sofia University. She began translating as a student. She is member of the Bulgarian Translators' Union, and since 2022, the chairman of the "Fiction and Humanities" section. She has translated works by George Orwell, Henry James, Charlotte Brontë, Edgar Allan Poe, William Saroyan and Stephen King, as well as non-fiction.




Elvana Zaimi Tufa
Elvana Zaimi Tufa holds a PhD in Literary Studies with focus on translation theory and studies. She studied Language and Literature at the University of Tirana and taught Albanian Renaissance Literature, Creative Writing and Introduction to Aesthetics at the Alexander Moisiu University in Duras. She is a literary translator from English and Italian. Her translations include authors such as Henry Miller, Virginia Woolf, Lee-Yong Lee, Haruki Murakami, Truman Capote. In the Albanian literary press, she also published translations of poets such as Gertrude Stein, Joseph Brodsky, Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton. She has organized literary events and readings in Albania. He is currently a freelance translator focusing on American and English literature.





Ivana Tomić
Ivana Tomić, classicist, literary translator with more than one hundred and twenty published titles, independent artist, member of the Association of Literary Translators of Serbia, freelancer, passionate traveler and reader. Unique education, broad spectrum of interests, burning curiosity as well as fascination with languages introduced me to the world of publishing, where as a proud part of the team I help the most valuable examples of the world's written word to be born in the Serbian as well as in the English language.

Photo credit: Maja Gugleta Nebe 

Iglika VassilevaIglika Vassileva is a literary translator from English, known for over 60 translations, including epoch-making titles by James Joyce, Somerset Maugham, Paul Auster, Walt Whitman, Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, Virginia Woolf, Henry James, John Banville, William Wharton, etc. Winner of the award of the Bulgarian Translator’s Union for 1993, 1998 and 2006, award of the Ministry of Culture for 1998, the national award "Hristo G. Danov" for 2003 and 2004, the award of the Municipality of Sofia for outstanding achievements in the field of culture for 2010 and "Krstan Dyankov" award for 2008, 2011 and 2015.



Maria Pipeva
Maria Pipeva is an English scholar, teacher and researcher in the field of translation studies with a focus on the translation of children's literature, British literature and culture. Translator and editor of works for children and of English-language humanities and fiction. In 2015, she was awarded the annual prize of the St. Petersburg State University for Outstanding Achievements in the Field of Theory, History and Criticism of Translation, for the book "Own in Foreign, Foreign in Own: Bulgarian Translations of English Children's Literature" (University of St. Kliment Ohridski ”, 2014).

Neva Micheva
Neva Micheva is a translator with a Master's degrees in Italian philology and Journalism. Among the authors she has translated are Primo Levi, Dino Buzzati, Manuel Puig, Italo Calvino, Antonio Tabucchi, Roberto Bolaño. A number of her translations of theatre pieces have been staged in Bulgarian theatres (Jordi Galceran, Juan Mayorga, etc.).




Rajna Koshka
Prof. Dr. Rajna Koshka is Full Professor of English Literature at the Department of English Language and Literature of Blazhe Koneski Faculty of Philology, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia. She teaches courses in English Renaissance Drama, Shakespeare Studies, modern and postmodern British drama and feminist theory. She is co-founder of the Macedonian Association of Translators and Interpreters and translation has always been one of her major interests.


Yana Genova
Yana Genova is the director of Next Page foundation and the founder of the Sofia Literature and Translation House with many years of international experience in programming and management of cultural projects, cultural policy and research in the field of culture.



 

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The Autumn Studio for Literary Translation is part of the Translation in Motion project (1/2/21-31/8/23) co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union and by the National Culture Fund, Bulgaria.