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Martin Solotruk

Martin Solotruk is a poet, cultural manager, translator, and academic researcher, born (1970) in Bratislava, Slovakia. He graduated in English and American studies and in Slovak literature, having also received stipends and education at Azusa Pacific University, California, and the University of Warwick, UK, on a prestigious EU postgraduate scholarship, and later received his PhD. in translation studies and taught American literature, English literature, cultural studies and artistic translation for over 20 years at Comenius Faculty of Arts, before moving to the Faculty of Law to teach legal and diplomatic language.

He also spent some years in television and advertising working as creative team leader and studio director. Solotruk's first book of poetry Tiché vojny (Silent Wars, 1997) won the Slovak Literary Fund Best Debut Award. His later books of poetry include Mletie (Grinding, 2001), Planktón gravitácie (Plankton of Gravity, 2006), Lovestory: Agens And Paciens, (2007), and The Metaphysical Household (2017). His upcoming book of poetry, Atoms Beyond the Window, is due in 2025.

Solotruk has directed Ars Poetica, a renowned international poetry festival and publishing house (www.arspoetica.sk), an organization based in Bratislava, Slovakia, since 2003. As a cultural manager and expert, Solotruk was invited to participate and talk at major conferences (e.g. “The language of Europe”, Brussels, November 2008)) organized by the European Commission, personally hosted by The President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso, and the Commissioner Leonard Orban. For Ars Poetica, Solotruk also led, as artistic director and statutory representative, all four EACEA funded Partner Cooperation projects that it successfully took part in as beneficiary and partner. Ars Poetica has been a member festival of Versopolis Platform, the only poetry platform in Europe supported by the Commission, since its inception in 2016.

Solotruk has also been active in multiple collaborative and interdisciplinary projects, as a poet and manager, including international projects involving a range of world poets, musicians, contemporary dancers, digital artists, including shows and projects presented at Poesie Festival Berlin, StAnza in Scotland, theatres and scenes in Bratislava, Bristol, Prague, Cracow, Venice, New York, New Orleans, New Delhi, and elsewhere. He also translates poetry and drama from English. His award winning book selections include e.g. works of Charles Simic, John Ashbery, and Ted Hughes. Plays in his translations were staged in major theatres in Slovakia, including the Slovak National Theatre. For his translation of Ted Hughes' The Crow he won the 2007 prize for the best artistic translation in Slovakia.

The Heart of Rača was awarded also to the university teacher Martin Solotruk

As a poet he has so far published five poetry collections: Tiché vojny (Silent Wars, 1997), for which he was awarded the Premium of Ivan Krasko Prize for the best debut, Mletie (Grinding, 2001), Lovestory: Agens a paciens (Lovestory: Agent and Patient, 2007), Planktón gravitácie (Plankton of Gravity, 2006) and Metafyzická domácnosť I (Metaphysical Household I, 2017) and was invited to read at leading poetry festivals in the world such as the Xichang Qionghai Lake Silk Road International Poetry Week, China (2016), Felix Poetry Festival Antwerp (2015), IFOA Toronto (2014), Vilenica (2013), Poesie Festival Berlin (2012, 2006), Genoa International Poetry Festival (2010), Stanza St. Andrews (2007) and Taipei International Poetry Festival (2005).

His poetry came out in book-length translations in English, German, Spanish, Dutch and Hindi, and a selections of his texts were translated into twelve languages including representative anthologies such as Lob des Wildtiers in Winter. Gedichte aus der Slowakei (Verlag Das Wunderhorn, 2014), New European Poets (Graywolf Press, 2008), A Fine Line: New Poetry from Eastern and Central Europe (Arc Publications, 2004). His poems in English translation appear in the database of academic and artistic texts CEEOL. Solotruk also attended, as an invited expert, several conferences organised by the European Commission – with personal involvement and under the auspices of the Chairman José Manuel Barroso.

Martin Solotruk is also the managing editor of the Ars Poetica Publishing House and a director of the namesake International poetry festival which, during the span of thirteen editions, featured a number of leading poets as well as rising stars of the contemporary world poetry. He has also initiated a number of other interdisciplinary projects including the European Poetry Forum platform.

The Ars Poetica International Poetry Festival brought to Comenius University, Faculty of Arts, a number of leading personalities of contemporary English-speaking poetry and science, i.e. Robert Pinsky (Poet Laureate USA), Carolyn Forché (Lannan Chair of Poetry, Georgetown University), Ron Padgett (Chancellor, American Academy of Poets), Ciaran Carson (T.S. Eliot Prize holder), Rod Mengham (University of Cambridge) and many other.

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Poetry In Translation

Works Published in Anthologies



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