The Ministry of Culture ensures Romania’s presence at the Sofia International Book Fair from 5 to 10 December 2023.
At the national stand located in the National Palace of Culture (NDK) in the centre of Sofia, the public will have the opportunity to meet writers Ohara Donovetsky, Flavius Ardelean-Bachmann and Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu. The moderation and translation of the events will be provided by Lora Nenkovska and Vanina Bojikova, translators of numerous volumes of contemporary Romanian literature into Bulgarian and promoters of Romanian culture in Bulgaria.
On this occasion, the Bulgarian edition of Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu’s novel The Childhood of Kaspar Hauser (Polirom, 2019 / Janet 45, 2022, translation Lora Nenkovska) will be launched, as well as two previews: Ohara Donovetsky, Casting for Bears (Polirom, 2018 / Paradox, 2024, translation Vanina Bojikova), and Flavius Ardelean-Bachmann, Rare Veins (Nemira, 2021 / Colibri, 2024, translation Vasilka Alexova).
The full programme of Romanian events at the Sofia International Book Fair, edition 5 – 10 December 2023, is as follows:
Saturday 9 December
11.00 – 12.00
How well do we know our neighbours? Georgi Gospodinov and Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu in dialogue
Moderation and translation: Lora Nenkovska, Vanina Bojikova
17.00 – 18.30
What’s next? Romanian literary previews for Bulgarian readers in the presence of authors and translators
Ohara Donovetsky, Casting for Bears (Polirom, 2018 / Paradox, 2024, translation Vanina Bojikova)
Flavius Ardelean-Bachmann, Rare Veins (Nemira, 2021 / Colibri, 2024, translation Vasilka Alexova)
Moderation and translation: Lora Nenkovska, Vanina Bojikova
Sunday 10 December
11.00 – 12.00
Book launch, in the presence of the author and translator: Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu, The Childhood of Kaspar Hauser (Polirom, 2019 / Janet 45, 2022, translation Lora Nenkovska)
Moderation and translation: Lora Nenkovska, Vanina Bojikova
12.00 – 13.00
Peculiarities and specificities. Is there a common Romanian-Bulgarian space?
Participate: Ohara Donovetsky, Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu, Flavius Ardelean, Vasilka Alexova, Bulgarian editors.
Moderation and translation: Lora Nenkovska, Vanina Bojikova
Romania’s presence at the Book Fair in the Bulgarian capital enjoys, every year, a real success, the events at the national stand being always appreciated by the public, authors, publishers, translators.
We would like to reiterate that in 2014 Romania was the guest of honour of the fair.
In a special event, the most important contemporary Bulgarian writer, Georgi Gospodinov, recent winner of the prestigious International Booker Prize, will hold a dialogue at the Romanian stand with author and editor Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu on current literary themes.
Ohara Donovetsky (b. 1969) graduated from the Faculty of Letters of the University of Bucharest (1994), holds a Master’s degree in Comparative Literature and Theory of Literature (1995), is a doctor of philology and a writer. She collaborated at the Institute of Linguistics “Iorgu Iordan – Alexandru Rosetti” of the Romanian Academy (2012), participated in the TVR2 programme With Note 2 You Pass the Maturity Examination (2013) and taught Romanian language and literature at the Tudor Vianu College in Bucharest (1997 – 2017). She is the author of the novels Casting for Bears (nominated in 2018 for the Romanian Writers’ Union Awards, Debut Book section), Encounters of a Wandering Teacher (2019) and Puzzle with the Fishmonger (2020), of the volume Grammar of Romanian as a Story (2013, reissued in 2014), of the book of essays on phraseology Words of a speaker in traveller’s clothes. On how to use Romanian sayings when you’re far away and you miss them (2021) and the volume of poetry Menu with the Wolf at the Lap (2022). She is the author of Cozonac for four hands (2021), in collaboration with Doina Jela. She is present in anthologies, with essays in Prof de română I, III, IV (coordinator vol. III) and with short prose in Code Name: Flash Fiction (2019), Literatura in Feminine (2021) and The Greatest Wonders (2023).
She publishes articles in Dilema veche, Planeta Babel and writes the column Star-Words and Lady-Words with a Veil in the Cultural Observatory.
Flavius Ardelean-Bachmann is a writer of fantasy literature for adults and children, member of the Horror Writers Association. He has published nine novels and three volumes of short stories, for which he has received two Colin Awards for Fantasy Literature. His debut volume, The Taming of the Waters, was nominated at the Festival du Premier Roman de Chambéry, France, and Flavius Ardelean has been nominated twice consecutively for the Young Writer of the Year award at the Young Writers’ Gala in Bucharest for his novels in the Miasma cycle. His books for children, Bezna and Mecanopolis, have been nominated for the Book of the Year Award at the Cultural Year Awards in Brasov. His novels and short stories have been translated into English, Russian, Hungarian and German and have been well received by the press and reviewed in Publishers Weekly, Esquire, Tageszeitung, Börsenblatt, Bücher Magazin and SWR2.
Bogdan-Alexandru Stănescu (b. 1979) is a prose writer, poet, essayist, translator and editor. He is currently the editorial director of Pandora M, part of the Trei Publishing Group, and coordinator of the Anansi collection. In 2010, together with Vasile Ernu, he published the volume of dialogues What separates us. Epistolar from the Manuc bey Inn (Polirom), and in 2012 he made his debut as a poet, with the volume Then, After the Battle, We Fired the Heart (Cartea Românească), a volume nominated for the Observator Cultural magazine awards and the Radio Romania Cultural awards for 2012. In 2013, he published the volume of essays Enter Ghost. Imaginary Letters towards Ossip Mandelstam, and in 2014, his second volume of poems, anaBASis (Cartea Românească Publishing House), a book nominated for the Radio România Cultural awards. In 2017 he published the novel Kaspar Hauser’s Childhood (Polirom Publishing House), awarded with the Prize for prose of the literary club Nepotu’ of Thoreau, the Prize for prose Radio România Cultural, the Prize of the Festival of the First Novel of Chambery, France, 2018 edition and nominated on the short list of the European Union Prize for Literature, 2018 edition. In 2019 he published the biographical novel Caragiale. A Lost Letter, in 2021 the volume of poems Adorable Etruscians (Charmides Publishing House), nominated in 2022 for the Observator Cultural Magazine Awards and the ARCA Awards and winner of the “George Coșbuc” National Prize for Poetry and in spring 2022, the novel Abraxas (Polirom Publishing House), winner of the Observator Cultural Magazine Award for prose, the Ziarului de Iași Prize for prose and nominated for the Ficțiunea Magazine Awards and the Radio Romania Cultural Awards. In 2023 he published, together with Vasile Ernu, the volume of epistolary essays The Center doesn’t Hold anymore. What separates us (Editura Trei). Since 2012 he has been a doctor in literature, with the thesis The works of Emil Botta: Ars moriendi. He has translated from Alberto Manguel, James Joyce, Tennessee Williams, William Faulkner, Sandra Newman, Sue Prideaux, Edward Hirsch, Daniel Mendelsohn, Paul Auster, Philip Roth, Louise Glück, Hannah Arendt and C.G. Jung.
This text is a press release of the Romanian Ministry of Culture.
Photo: Romanian stand at the Sofia Book Fair (source: Iulia Bahovski)
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