Tag Archives: Wisława Szymborska

‘Literary Theft’ in Hungarian

My short story “Literary Theft” has been published in the Hungarian magazine Kulter in a translation by Ági Bori Mottern. Other writers published in the magazine include Wisława Szymborska, Frank O’Hara, Joyce Carol Oates and Margaret Atwood. It’s my third publication in Hungary but first one in Hungarian. Read the story in Kulter here Read […]

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Right turn for the next renaissance – Part II: In nihilism we trust

Part I: where American conservative Charles Murray’s scientific assessment of periods of cultural greatness is held up to a closer scrutiny than he would probably care for. The further Murray’s essay goes on, the more his conditions for cultural greatness fall into a deeper and deeper murkiness. At one point he sets up a hypothetical […]

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Literary roundup: Poets of our mad, transitory world

“To your mad world—one answer: I refuse.” – from new translations by Ilya Kaminsky and Jean Valentine of Marina Tsvetaeva’s “Poems to Czechoslovakia.” The latest issue of Poetry magazine features a number of selections of the work of Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva. I will soon be writing something about Tsvetaeva’s brief but impactful time living […]

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Literary roundup: Life’s cheerless dance – Szymborska, Joseph Roth and Satantango

Wisława Szymborska died on February 1 and as the remembrances and tributes pour forth a couple of very good ones that have come out in the last few days include Ruth Franklin’s “A Requiem to an Age of Brilliant Polish Poetry” at The New Republic and James Hopkin’s recollection of an interview with the poet […]

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