LIVE from the NYPL: PEN American Center presents JONATHAN GALASSI

May 1, 2011

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President of the venerable publishing house, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, Jonathan Galassi goes head-to-head with the illustrious German poet-translator and artistic director of Germany's acclaimed Berliner Festspiele Joachim Sartorius. Sartorius was awarded the Paul Scheebart Prize for his translations of contemporary American poetry in 1998 and elected fellow of the German Academy for Language and Literature in 2002. Together, with American poet Rosanna Warren, they discuss the fine nuances of translation and poetry.

JONATHAN GALASSI has worked for Houghton Mifflin Company, Random House, and Farrar, Straus and Giroux, where he has served as president of the firm since January 2002. Galassi has published two books of poetry, Morning Run and North Street, and has translated the work of Italian poets Eugenio Montale and Giacomo Leopardi. He has won numerous awards, including the PEN/Roger Klein Award for Editing in 1984, the LMP Editor’s Award in 1990, and the Maxwell Perkins Award from the Mercantile Library/Center for Fiction, among others. Galassi was president of the Academy of American Poets from 1994 to 1999.

JOACHIM SARTORIUS is a former head of the Goethe Institute Worldwide. Since 2001, he has been the Director General of the Berliner Festspiele. Sartorius has received fellowships from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Budapest Collegium, and was elected a fellow of the German Academy for Language and Literature in 2002. He has translated the collected works of Malcolm Lowry and William Carlos Williams, and Atlas der neuen Poesie (1995), the highly-regarded international poetry anthology. Sartorius was awarded the Paul Scheerbart Prize for his translations of contemporary American poetry. His own poetry has been collected in six volumes, the latest of which, Hôtel des Étrangers (2008), is available in English, Spanish, French, Greek, and Arabic editions.

ROSANNA WARREN, Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 1999 to 2005, is an award-winning poet and editor. Her collection, Stained Glass, won the Lamont Poetry Award from the Academy of American Poets, and is also the recipient of the Witter Bynner Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Lavan Younger Poets’ Prize from the Academy of American Poets, and the Award of Merit in Poetry from The American Academy of Arts and Letters. She has won fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, ACLS, The Ingram Merrill Foundation, and the Lila Wallace Readers’ Digest Fund, among others. Her latest collection is Ghost In a Red Hat (2011).

 

The Seventh Annual PEN World Voices of International Literature: April 25 to May 1, 2011

More than 100 writers from 40 nations convene in New York City to celebrate the power of the writer’s voice as a bold and vital element of public discourse. Dare to view the world from a fresh perspective at stages across the city, including the festival’s hubs -- The Standard, New York and the High Line. The program features panel discussions, one-on-one conversations, readings, performances, and much more. www.pen.org/festival