Writers and translators often maintain that their real home is language. In whatever tongue they speak or create, wherever they live or travel, ultimately their only real home is language-both a rational and an irrational miracle, which helps them recreate reality: to give voice to, and to tell of, their own experience and that of the world through poetry, prose, drama and translation. The English author Virginia Woolf proposed that writers need few worldly goods in order to create-just money and a room of their own. This need is more keenly felt in today’s society, where a writer, like everyone else, is caught up in the nervous flow of daily life. It is, therefore, no wonder that creative centres for writers and translators have become so highly valued and well-loved, particularly in Europe. For a short while, you are away from your usual existence, from the everyday and life’s responsibilities, and can allow yourself the pleasure of being a full-time writer. You recreate reality and are together with colleagues: brothers and sisters in language. You feel calm in the knowledge that in this rational and pragmatic world there are many others who, like you, devote themselves to the difficult, beautiful and exclusive task that is working with language. The Baltic Centre for Writers and Translators in Visby, Gotland, Ledig House in America, Casa Pantrovà in Switzerland, the Writers’ and Translators’ House in Käsmu, Estonia, and many, many others are now joined by Ventspils Writers’ and Translators’ House in Latvia.
Here, on the vast world map, is another place where language lives, where experiences meet, where each writer tells the same ancient mystery-of life, death and love-in his or her own language. The historic former town hall, located on the square between the renewed city library and the Lutheran church, has been remodelled as a centre for writers and translators from around the world, providing an opportunity for them to meet and work.
The writers’ studies have modern facilities but have not lost a touch of history and are ready to offer a warm haven to the Ventspils House language-travellers. The inner garden and sauna create a feeling that the process of writing has some connection to faith and divine revelation, accompanied by a succumbing to some sinful joys...
Here, everything is in one place-solitude and conversation, work and respite, daily bread and wine. When weary of work, residents can wander round Ventspils-a well-maintained coastal city, where, in each house, street, yard and square, the past is just as important as the future. Having walked through a green park, the language-traveller suddenly finds himself on the beach. He is free to go wherever his eye takes him, in one direction or the other-kilometres of beautiful, white, sandy coastline stretch into the far distance: just the sky and sea on one side, a strip of green forest on the other, and the walker, who treads the sand and opens his mind to the creative moment.
Who knows, perhaps this century’s most beautiful literary stories of life and love will be created right here, at the Ventspils house of language. Let it happen!
Nora Ikstena
riters and translators often maintain that their real home is language. In whatever tongue they speak or create, wherever they live or travel, ultimately their only real home is language-both a rational and an irrational miracle, which helps them recreate reality: to give voice to, and to tell of, their own experience and that of the world through poetry, prose, drama and translation. The English author Virginia Woolf proposed that writers need few worldly goods in order to create-just money and a room of their own. This need is more keenly felt in today’s society, where a writer, like everyone else, is caught up in the nervous flow of daily life. It is, therefore, no wonder that creative centres for writers and translators have become so highly valued and well-loved, particularly in Europe. For a short while, you are away from your usual existence, from the everyday and life’s responsibilities, and can allow yourself the pleasure of being a full-time writer. You recreate reality and are together with colleagues: brothers and sisters in language. You feel calm in the knowledge that in this rational and pragmatic world there are many others who, like you, devote themselves to the difficult, beautiful and exclusive task that is working with language.
..
The Baltic Centre for Writers and Translators in Visby, Gotland, Ledig House in America, Casa Pantrovà in Switzerland, the Writers’ and Translators’ House in Käsmu, Estonia, and many, many others are now joined by Ventspils Writers’ and Translators’ House in Latvia. Here, on the vast world map, is another place where language lives, where experiences meet, where each writer tells the same ancient mystery-of life, death and love-in his or her own language. The historic former town hall, located on the square between the renewed city library and the Lutheran church, has been remodelled as a centre for writers and translators from around the world, providing an opportunity for them to meet and work.
The writers’ studies have modern facilities but have not lost a touch of history and are ready to offer a warm haven to the Ventspils House language-travellers. The inner garden and sauna create a feeling that the process of writing has some connection to faith and divine revelation, accompanied by a succumbing to some sinful joys...
Here, everything is in one place-solitude and conversation, work and respite, daily bread and wine.
When weary of work, residents can wander round Ventspils-a well-maintained coastal city, where, in each house, street, yard and square, the past is just as important as the future. Having walked through a green park, the language-traveller suddenly finds himself on the beach. He is free to go wherever his eye takes him, in one direction or the other-kilometres of beautiful, white, sandy coastline stretch into the far distance: just the sky and sea on one side, a strip of green forest on the other, and the walker, who treads the sand and opens his mind to the creative moment.
Who knows, perhaps this century’s most beautiful literary stories of life and love will be created right here, at the Ventspils house of language. Let it happen!
Nora Ikstena
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International Project Coordinator of the Ventspils House
Rita Dementjeva
rita
latvianliterature.lv
International Project Coordinator of the Ventspils House
Brenda Lelie
brenda.lelieventspilshouse.lv
Board member
Ieva Balode
ieva.balodeventspilshouse.lv
+371
26449426
Accountant of the Ventspils House
Iveta
Līberga
iveta.libergaventspilshouse.lv
+371
26176424
Bank details:
SIA "Starptautiskā Rakstnieku
un
tulkotāju māja"
Registration No 41203024801
State Treasury
Account
LV68TREL9220920000000
Swedbank
Account
LV67HABA0551010754947
International Project Coordinator of the Ventspils House
Inga Bodnarjuka-Mrazauskas
inga.bodnarjuka
gmail.com
Mob.phone: +371 25936493
Assistant manager of the Ventspils House
Zeltīte Freiberga
zeltite.freibergaventspilshouse.lv
+371
26589712, +371 63623596
Bank details:
SIA "Starptautiskā Rakstnieku
un
tulkotāju māja"
Reģistrācijas Nr. 41203024801
Swedbank
Konta Nr.
LV68TREL9220920000000
Swedbank
Konta Nr.
LV67HABA0551010754947
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Kurzemes Poetry Days Kurzemes Poetry Days is a festival what takes place every year in Kurzeme region in different cities and this year in Ventspils. Poets from the region will come and have readings in different places of Ventspils. Kurzemes Poetry Days will start at 11.00 with the event "Garainis" in the Parventa library. Tārgales iela 4. The exhibition "Plein-air in Pholx" will be opened, with the works of Daiga Krūze, Kristīna Keire, Ieva Rupenheite and Jānis Kupčs, members of the plein-air of Pope Manor. This will be followed by a discussion about creativity led by Dace Vašuka and poetry reading by Ieva Rupenheite . Maija Kalniņa will perform songs with Olaf Gūtmanis and her own poetry. At 13:30 poet Iveta Dārzniece-Tarvida , will read her poetry in the new Gāliņciema library, Kuldīgas iela 138. At 14:30 nearby, Laura Vinogradova will read her poetry in local Ventiņ dialect at the Herberta Dorbes Museum, Ērgļu iela 1. At 16:00 Andris Akmentiņš will read his poetry in the Livonian Order Castle, accompanied with pianist Andrejs Martiņš Grīnbergs, Jāņa iela 17 At the end of the poetry days at 17:00, poet Jānis Vādons will read his poetry on the roof of the VIZIUM science center and there will be also readings by Kurzeme poets, Rūpniecības iela 2.
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Tasmanian artist and writer commemorates 14 June deportations with a performance at Ventspils market Tasmanian artist and writer, Brigita Ozolins, will commemorate the 1941 deportation of 15,500 Latvians to Siberia with a one-day performance on 14 June in the Ventspils Market. Starting in the morning, she will nail copies of the top secret NKVD documents that list the names, birthdates and addresses of those who were arrested on 13 and 14 June in 1941 to the wooden walls of the market stage. The lists have been sourced from These Names Accuse, a book that documents Order No 001223, signed by the Deputy People’s Commissar of Public Security of the USSR, Serov. Brigita will continue the performance by handwriting the names of all the people who were arrested in Ventspils on sheets of paper. After completing each page, she will ring a bell and nail it to the walls of the stage alongside the other pages. The performance will start at 9am and finish at 6pm. IMembers of the public will be permitted to climb onto the stage to view the performance and the pages nailed to the stage walls. Brigita is a resident at the International Writers and Translators house where she is editing a novel she has written about her mother’s escape from Latvia during WW2. She said that while the performance commemorates all the deportees of June 1941, it is also dedicated to the memory of her late mother, Mirdza Ozolins, and her mother’s friend, Aldona Ikmanis, who was amongst the deportees. ‘My mother was fourteen years old when she witnessed Aldona and her family being arrested by the Soviets on 14 June, 1941,’ said Brigita. ‘She never saw her friend again but two years ago, we found out that Aldona was released from a gulag in Novosibirsk in 1956. We both cried, happy that Aldona had been freed, but deeply saddened because she had spent fifteen years in a labour camp in Siberia.’ Brigita is well known in Tasmania for her performances and large-scale installations that explore the relationships between language, culture, history, writing and codes. A first draft of her book was longlisted for the Richell Emerging Writers Prize in 2021 and in 2022, she was awarded and Australian Society of Authors mentorship. She has also received a Latvian State Capital Culture Foundation grant to support her residency. She will be resident at the Writers House until the 28 June. |
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Multilingual poetry readings In September, the Serbian translator Vera Horvat, who came to learn the Latvian language and translate the works of Latvian poets, is visiting the International House of Writers and Translators with the support of the EU Creative Europe project "Translation in Motion". Vera Horvat, together with other authors from the Writers' House, will perform at the poetry reading on September 8, 17.00 in the Pārventas library at Multilingual Poetry Readings. At the event, we will hear Vera’s Horvat reading in Serbian, Petro Tarashchuk in Ukrainian, Valerya Kustava in Belarusian, Monika Littau in German and Katrīna Rudzīti in Latvian. Vera Horvat is an art scholar and translator from Serbia. Starting from 1992, she published her first translations from Russian, and in 2000 she received the most important award in Serbia for poetry translation. Since then, she has translated more than 20 books of poetry; most of them are associated with poetry festivals and published as bilingual books. Vera Horvat lives in Serbia and her native language is Serbian and her second native language is Russian. She has also translated from English and Bulgarian. She mainly translates contemporary poetry. The project is financially supported by the Creative Europe program of the EU #CreativeEurope4Books.
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Maryliis Teinfeldt-Grins (Estonia) Maryliis Teinfeldt-Grins, is an artist and writer whose practice delves into the transformations of landscapes, language, and memory. Her multidisciplinary work encompasses embroidery, photography, tapestry, drawing, and poetry composed in dialect. Lina Melnyk (Ukraine) Lina Melnyk is a translator and journalist from Vinnytsia, Ukraine. She holds a Master’s degree in Psychology from Vinnytsia State Pedagogical University. She is a member of the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine. With the support of the Latvian Embassy in Ukraine, since 2013 she has covered Latvian cultural events for the Ukrainian press. Lina co-founded and served as the artistic director, producer, and screenwriter for the Ukrainian amateur theatre "Resurs." Since 2018, she has been professionally involved in translating Latvian literature into Ukrainian. Her translations include works by notable Latvian authors such as Jānis Akuraters, Rūdolfs Blaumanis, Nora Ikstena, Māra Zālīte, and others. Alla Kudziieva (Ukraine) And one more poem And what... And why...” was printed and posted online in the Ukrainian Literary Gazette (UA). Baiba Baikovska (Latvia) Baiba Baikovska - a writer who sees writing as an opportunity to share her experiences through stories and as a beautiful way to express herself and gain joy, peace and strength. Baiba has shared her stories and experiences with many people in different media (for example https://www.penopp.org/.../what-do-trains-and-toilets... and https://www.joniandfriends.org/wheelchairs-on-mission/) and in stand-up shows. This year her first book "Elfa - a dog, not a human" was published (https://www.lsm.lv/.../18.06.2024-milestibas-dziesma.../). Neva Micheva (Bulgaria) Neva Micheva was born in 1973 and is a literary translator and freelance cultural journalist who focuses especially on film criticism. She holds an MA in Italian Philology from Sofia University and an MA in Journalism from Madrid’s CEU San Pablo University. She translates from the Italian, Spanish, Catalan, Russian, and English into Bulgarian, and has provided Bulgarian versions of many writers and dramatists, including Italo Calvino, Antonio Tabucchi, Manuel Puig, Javier Marías, Roberto Bolaño, and Dino Buzzati. Inga Žolude (Latvia) Inga Žolude (born 1984) is a Latvian prose writer. She studied English literature at the University of Latvia, and upon receiving the Fulbright scholarship attended Southern Illinois University in the USA (2008 - 2009). In 2015, she obtained her PhD. Žolude's first novel Warm Earth/Silta zeme was published in 2008. Since then two more novels, Red Children/Sarkanie bērni (2012) and Santa Biblia (2013), have been published. For her collection of stories A Solace for the Adam’s Tree/ Mierinājums Ādama kokam (2010), she received the EU Prize for Literature. Her story Dirty Laundry was included in the "Best European Fiction 2014" anthology (Dalkey Archive Press). In 2015, her book Stories was published. In 2018 Žolude published Materia botanica and 1904. Melancholic waltz. She frequently writes reviews on Latvian and foreign literature. Žolude is a member of the Latvian Writers' Union since 2010. Her works have been translated into numerous languages, including English, German, French, Swedish, Polish, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Czech and Bulgarian. Jānis Ābele (Latvia)
This month's residents
Teinfeldt-Grins obtained her degree in Textile from the Pallas University of Applied Sciences. She furthered her studies in the Department of Textile Art at the Art Academy of Latvia. Continuing her artistic journey, she pursued a master's program in Contemporary Art at the Estonian Academy of Arts, which she completed in 2022. Currently, Teinfeldt-Grins shares her expertise as a lecturer at the Pallas University of Applied Sciences.
Her artistic achievements have garnered recognition, with accolades including the Eduard Wiiralt scholarship (2019) and the Adamson-Eric scholarship (2021) in the field of Estonian art. She has also received several literature prizes, such as being honored as the laureate of the 'First Step' literary prize at the Prima Vista literary festival and winning the Hendrik Adamson Award for her poetry written in dialect.
In 2002, I won the regional literature contest for my essay analyzing Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's "The Little Prince."
In 2003, I was expelled from the regional literature Olympiad for a revealing essay about the "Behind the Cover of Ukrainian Literature Icon" life of Taras Shevchenko.
I graduated from high school in 2014 as the former Minister of Culture of the School Parliament (2002) and the President of the School Parliament (2003).
In 2007, I signed a contract with Folio (the oldest book publishing house in Ukraine). One after the other, two of my books come out. These were several stories in the style of an urban romance, "Gossip of Two Mistresses" and "Blond Guy from the Red Army Street."
In 2012, I graduated from the television journalism course at the Sergei Slobodiyan School.
In 2013 I completed Alexei Mamedov's scriptwriting course.
In 2014 work as a 1st Id and co-screenwriter for the art-house film "8" by Alexander Shapiro.
In 2015, I wrote a postulate for a documentary about the burned-down iconic movie theater "Zhovten. The film won an award at the VIDEO and the CITY festival. Proud to say, that, the video had a wide reaction and was influential in saving the theater from the raider who caused the fire.
2015 - 2016 I performed three shows with readings of my short stories and musical accompaniment on small stages In Kyiv and Odesa.
In 2016, I became the creative director of the agency KUKU BURO until February 24, 2022.
In 2022, I got a writer residency at the Isla de Crear Art Center in Spain.
In 2022, my short stories "City of Scratched Skies" and "They Say Your Train is Delayed" were published in imprint and online in the oldest Ukrainian literature periodical Ukrainian Literary Gazette (UA).
The story "Martha and the Blue Tiger" was printed in Superpresent magazine (US). And two chapters from "Marta and the Blue Tiger" were published in the online magazine Espacio Fronterizo (EU).
In 2023, four more stories from the "Marta and the Blue Tiger" series were published online in the online magazine Espacio Fronterizo (EU). Also that year, "Marta" was published in print in Art Work Gallery magazine (UA), "101 Contemporary Artist and More..." book by Collect Art (GE), and reviewed online by Art Cabbage magazine (UK).
The poem “How do you allow yourself to run away from you?” was published in print and online by the Ukrainian Literary Gazette (UA).
In 2024 one more chapter of "Marta and the Blue Tiger" was at Espacio Fronterizo (EU).
And in her everyday life, Baiba has the hairiest (at least she thinks so) assistant in Latvia, Elfa (Labrador Retriever).
Photo Ģirts Reģelis
