Trafika Europe 6 - Arabesque

about the authors & works

Georgi Gospodinov Georgi Gospodinov (born in Yambol, Bulgaria, 1968) studied Bulgarian Philology at Sofia University. A widely-anthologized poet, now also a fiction writer and playwright, his well-received first novel, Natural Novel – “anarchic” and “experimental” (The New Yorker), “humorous, melancholy and highly idiosyncratic” (The Times) and “both earthy and intellectual” (The Guardian) – has been translated into 17 languages, and lauded for its fluid new kind of structure. ThePhysics of Sorrow is his second sort-of novel, tracing anarrative around questioning the myth of theMinotaur, while exploring the Bulgaria of the 1990s and its implications for today. It has won the Bulgarian Novel of the Year award, and this translation has just been long-listed by PEN as one of the best books in English translation of 2015. It is available from Open Letter Books. We spoke with Georgi Gospodinov about The Physics of Sorrow – you can enjoy this engaging audio conversation here (35minutes). Translated from Bulgarian by Angela Rodel.

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