The organisers on the Iaşi International Festival of Literature and Translation (FILIT) have announced the first names of foreign writers coming to Iaşi in the interval 2-6 October 2019, for the 7th edition of the Festival.
One of the confirmed names is that of Richard Ford, one of the most acclaimed contemporary American writers, the first writer to have received during the same year both the Pulitzer Prize ands the PEN/ Faulkner Award for Fiction, for his novel “Independence Day”.
FILIT will also host on of the most prominent Russian writers of the moment. Considered to be the most important Russian candidate for the Nobel Prize for literature, Mikhail Shyshkin is the only Russian writer to have received all three Russian top literary prizes: Russian Booker Prize, Russian National Bestseller and Big Book Prize.
The festivalgoers will also have the opportunity to meet María Dueñas, the Spanish writer whose novels have become international bestsellers, being translated into over 35 languages. Her novel, “El Tiempo Entre Costuras” / “The Time in Between” sold over one million copies and was adapted for television, to great international acclaim.
A laureate of the Goncourt Prize and of other important literary awards, the French writer and translator Mathias Enard will meet the Romanian public during FILIT. Other well-known French writers coming to FILIT are Yannick Haennel and Lionel Duroy.
The festival will also feature meetings with writers such as Sjon (Iceland) and Kim Leine (Denmark), both laureates of the Nordic Council Literature Prize. The books authored by Sjon (Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson) have been translated in 30 languages. He wrote the lyrics for many of Björk’s songs and was nominated for a Oscar for the lyrics to the soundtrack of the movie “Dancer in the Dark”, directed by Lars von Trier. One of the nest-known writers in Denmark, Kim Leine has received numerous awards, and his novel “Prophets of Eternal Fjord” has sold in over 20 countries.
The public will have the opportunity to meet Herman Koch, one of the most popular writers in the Netherlands, who is also an actor, a television producer and a journalist. His novel “Dinner” has been translated into 21 languages.
Another outstanding name confirmed for FILIT is the Turkish writer and human rights activist Aslı Erdoğan. She has worked at the European Centre for Nuclear Research in Geneva, and since 1996 she devoted herself to literature and journalism. She was arrested and imprisoned in August 2016, together with her colleagues from the opposition newspaper she was writing for (Özgür Gündem). In 2017 she received the Erich Maria Remarque Peace Prize, and in 2018 – the Simone de Beauvoir Award for women’s freedom.
The guest list is completed by Ahmed Saadawi (a poet, novelist and film producer from Iraq, winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction and nominated for the Man Booker Prize), Ilija Trojanov (Bulgaria-Germany; the film adaptation of his book “The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner” has won over 20 festival awards), Svetislav Basara (a remarkable writer from Serbia, whom international critics have called “a madman, a genius, an anarchist, an insolent, an entertainer, a sentimental”, saying he is “for literature what Kusturica is for cinematography”), Drago Jančar (one of the best writers, essay authors and playwrights in Slovenia, with works translated in over 21 languages, winner of numerous awards, among which the European Union Prize For Literature) and Geneviève Damas (writer, actress and director of contemporary theatre in Belgium).
FILIT is organised by the National Museum of Romanian Literature in Iași and funded by the County Council of Iași, being considered one of the larges literary festivals in Europe. The seventh edition will take place in between 2 and 6 October in Iași, and it will reunite writers, translators, cultural managers, editors and journalists from all over the world. The organisers will continue to update the list of participants.