Don't miss Diana Anphimiadi and Salome Benidze for the only London reading of their 2018 UK tour! These acclaimed poets from Georgia will read alongside award-winning British poets Jean Sprackland and Helen Mort, before discussing the delicate art of poetry translation with their bridge translator Natalia Bukia-Peters.

This event marks the publication of two new bilingual chapbooks: Beginning to Speak by Diana Anphimiadi (translated by Jean Sprackland and Natalia Bukia-Peters; supported by the Georgian National Book Center) and I Wanted to Ask You by Salome Benidze (translated by Helen Mort and Natalia Bukia-Peters).

This event will be in English with poetry readings in Georgian and English.

Presented in partnership with the SOAS Centre for Translation Studies.

Biography

Diana Anphimiadi is a poet, publicist, linguist and teacher. She has published four collections of poetry: Shokoladi (Chocolate, 2008), Konspecturi Mitologia (Resumé of Mythology, 2009), Alhlokhedvis Traektoria (Trajectory of the Short-Sighted, 2012) and Kulinaria (Personal Cuisine, 2013). Her poetry has received prestigious awards, including first prize in the 2008 Tsero and the Saba Award for best first collection in 2009. She lives in Tbilisi with her husband and young son.

Salome Benidze is a poet, novelist and translator, as well as a campaigner for women's rights. She won the Saba Award for best debut in 2012, which brought her nationwide recognition. She is the author of two collections of poetry and one novel, The City on Water which was a national bestseller and won the Tsinandali Award in 2015. Her works of translation include David Beckham's My Side, Shirin Ebadi's The Golden Cage and Salman Rushdie's Two years, eight months and twenty-eight nights.

Jean Sprackland's most recent collection, Sleeping Keys, was published in 2013, and Tilt won the Costa Poetry Award in 2007. She is also author of Strands, the winner of the Portico Prize for Non Fiction. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University, and Chair of the Poetry Archive.

Helen Mort was born in Sheffield. Her first collection Division Street won the Fenton Aldeburgh Prize. Her collection No Map Could Show Them (Chatto & Windus) was a PBS Recommended Title. In 2017 she presented Mother Tongue on BBC Radio 4, exploring poetry in translation. She is a Lecturer in Creative Writing in the Manchester Writing School.

Natalia Bukia-Peters is a freelance translator, interpreter and teacher of Georgian and Russian. She studied at Tbilisi State Institute of Foreign Languages before moving to New Zealand in 1992, then to Cornwall in 1994. She is a translator for the Poetry Translation Centre in London and a member of the Chartered Institute of Linguists, and translates a variety of literature, poetry and magazine articles. Her translations in collaboration with writer Victoria Field include short fiction and poetry by contemporary Georgian writers. Their most recent book is an anthology, A House with no Doors – Ten Georgian Women Poets (Francis Boutle, 2016).

The Poetry Translation Centre gives the best contemporary poems from Africa, Asia and Latin America a new life in the English language, working with diaspora communities for whom poetry is of great importance. By fostering creative collaborations between poets and translators, the PTC produces high-quality translations that extend the audience for international poetry.

Contact email: ns27@soas.ac.uk