Poetry Ride festival is touring in Latvia, Estonia, Finland and Norway on 24−29 November with poets Jan Kaus (EST), Miia Toivio (FIN), Kārlis Vērdiņš (LV) and Gunnar Wærness (NO). The multilingual program has been compiled by a poet, translator and artistic director of Poetry Ride Guntars Godiņš who also leads the meetings during the trip.

Poetry Ride has been driving through different countries for eight years, but this year is special: for the first time the festival heads to Norway with a focus on education of translation. Translating poetry is one of the most challenging tasks in the field of literature and demands special skills of creativity and sensibility to grasp the inner world of the lyrical text. In addition to writing poetry, the poets Kaus, Toivio, Vērdiņš and Wærness share their long experiences in translating and editing poetry.

Poetry Ride visits the universities of Daugavpils, Tartu, Eastern Finland and Tromsø and enable the meetings between the poets and the students of translation, literature and creative writing. There will be seminars concerning the art of translation at universities. The opening of the exhibition “Poetry Ride – the first 7 years” at the Daugavpils University
Library will also be part of the festival program.

Poetry Ride also welcomes everyone to the poetry reading evenings during the festival. You can hear poetry in an original language read by the poets and translated into the local language. The poems have been translated by Contra, Guntars Godiņš, Raija Hämäläinen, Jan Kaus, Jyrki Kiiskinen, Juris Kronbergs, Marja Leinonen, Øyvind Rangøy, Sigrid Tooming and Gunnar Wærness.

For further information visit Poetry Ride’s homepage.