Elena Bossi's discussion of "Writing as Philosophy and Craft" focuses on pseudonymity in fiction, titling her talk "The Names of the Other." Chris Chryssopoulos recalls philosophies of Jorge Luis Borges, Immanuel Kant, Ludwig Wittgenstein, but...
Maryam Ala Amjadi is a poet and translator from Iran. For her, the act of translating is in itself a form of self-exile, because the writer is forced to distance themselves from their mother tongue and in so doing, they become spectators both of...
Kavery Nambisan describes the migrant writer's thought-space, not losing rootedness whether traveling in the real or in the imagination. Saša Stanišić's talk is titled, "How You See Us: on Three Myths about Migrant Writing," and covers the myth...
Welsh author Fflur Dafydd discusses the difference between expression in Welsh and English, contrasting the often euphemistic nature of Welsh with the more straightforward character of English. She then gives examples of how a novel she wrote in...
Agnes Lam, using few words as is her preference, writes poetry because it is something she likes to do. Hu Xudong's talk, "From the Margin of a Painting to Plural Inner Selves," describes the myriad transitions he has gone through growing from a...
Simone Inguanez chooses to stand in her poetry, a place that can neither be created nor destroyed. James Na divides his presentation into three topics: the hibernation of Phillippine-Chinese literature, the Phillippine-Chinese literature under the...
International authors and filmmakers meet to discuss their perspectives on translating writing into film and television. Lou Ye experiments with how changing the delivery of message changes the thoughts that get delivered. Rafael Courtoisie's talk...
Beyond describing the necessary qualities in translating poetry--"honesty, musical ears, investigating for the right things behind things"--Nadia Abduljabbar's talk goes into the difficulties of translating cultural experiences and expectations...
Rogelio Saunders, a Cuban, reads from his essay “The Second Realization.” The title derives from his classification of two moments of globalization in human history – the more recent phenomena of international relations and when Columbus...
Doris Kareva discusses her belief that literary translation is akin to alchemy, being about creation and recreation, and that transformation is only possible through passionate people taking on texts that are absolutely necessary for them to...
Brian Falkner elaborates on how writing validates his existence. John Nkemngong Nkengasong titles his talk "The Naked Muse: Echoes from a Writer’s Soul" and conjures the influences that become the ingredients of his creative energy. Laila...
Madeleine Thien's talk is titled, "The Shattered Mirror: On the Migrant in Literature and Politics," and says that "my writing allows me to reflect a self that is often in-between places, that is restless and that is not satisfied." Gutierrez...
Kyoko Yoshida tackles the topic of fantasy and reality through identifying "disorientalism" in four parts, taking his audience on a journey that beings with a story by Edgar Allen Poe and ends with Coleridge pursuing the real, rebuilt, Xanadu....
Niq Mhlongo's talk is titled "Still Searching for the Gleam: The Unreal Realities of Joburg City in a Post-Apartheid South African Novel," referring to Johannesburg's lure into fantasies of comfort, convenience, pleasure, and fortune, and discusses...
K.V. Tirumalesh discusses literature, translation, and criticism in this talk given at the Iowa City Public Library on Oct. 6, 2004. Sulkhan Zhordania's talk, "On the Symbolic Action and the Symbolic Association," covers the ideas in stories and...
Milosz Biedrzycki's talk, titled "Jan Kochanowski: Across the Languages, Beyond the Boundaries," discusses the 16th-century poet, who wrote in Polish and Latin, and his centuries-long impact on Polish poetry. Andrea Hirata's talk, "Translating...