Just a hurried post – term has started, we’re trying to do up the new house, and I’ve had loads of translation work, so everything’s been very busy the last few weeks. I’m currently copy-editing a collection of Palestinian poetry and preparing a ten-minute talk for International Translation Day at King’s Place on Friday – it looks a great event: I’m really looking forward to hearing Dominic Dromgoole on how Shakespeare works in different languages, and the novelist Andrei Kurkov.
I’ve also been doing five new translations for Somali Week in October – there’s going to be a programme of poetry events at Oxford House in Bethnal Green. It will be lovely to read with Caasha again, and it’s a chance to make some new discoveries – I’ve particularly been enjoying working on Said Salah’s poems. James Byrne is also doing some translations and will be reading. Those interested in sampling one of the world’s great poetry traditions should come along.
It’s been a sad few weeks for the Somali community with the loss of two much loved poets: Faysal Cumar Mushteeg and ‘Gaarriye’. If you haven’t heard of Gaarriye, he was considered one of the world’s great poets and this beautiful tribute by Sarah Maguire on the Poetry Translation Centre website is a good place to start for background and links to his performances. There’s also a moving post by WN Herbert, who translated much of Gaarriye’s work, here.
Will be back with a proper blog soon…
clarepollard 
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