Born Sacred
£13.46
Memories Pretend to Sleep
£10.99
Born in 1949, Julia Gjika grew up during the harshest years of Albanias Communist regime when literature from the West was strictly censored and her own poems were often not allowed in print. When compared to that of other countries in Europe, womens poetry in Albania is fairly recent, and Gjika belongs to the first generation of female poets, having published her first book, Birthday, in 1971, followed by Where I Find Poetry in 1978. In 1996, she immigrated with her family to the United States, where her poetry began to reflect the sacrifices of immigration. Gjikas work is characterized by an unflinching honesty, precision of thought and language, and the peculiar combination of wisdom with a childlike vulnerability. She is a poet who, like the child who puts her ear to the railroad track to hear her train coming, has felt everything deeply, and given herself permission in the face of it all to break into song.
Julia Gjika is an Albanian poet and essayist living and writing in the United States since 1996. She belongs to the first generation of Albanian women poets, having published her first book Ditëlindje (Birthday) in 1971, followed by Ku Gjej Poezinë (Where I Find Poetry) in 1978. Gjika is the author of two other collections of poetry from which these translations are taken: Muzg, 2007 (Dusk) and Ëndrra e Kthimit, 2010 (The Dream of Returning). Her poetry is characterized by an intensely moving and discerning examination of the immigrant experience. Her work is widely published in Albanian magazines, has been translated into Romanian and Polish, and has appeared in English in Two Lines Online, Gobshite Quarterly, 236 Magazine, Taos Journal of International Poetry and Art and elsewhere.
- ISBN-13
- 9781942281160
- Publisher
- Laertes, a Press for Literary
- Publication date
- 23 April 2020
- Format
- Paperback
- Pages
- 56
- Dimensions
- 215 x 140 mm
- Language
- English
