editorial March 2015

It’s good to resume publication after something of a hiatus, with the editorial team now reinforced by colleagues David Hamilton and Aron Aji. Thanks also to Se Young Kim and Elettra Pauletto for help on this issue. The journal, anchored by the work of the International Writing Program, keeps its ear to the globe’s literary ground, and to the issues, voices, styles, and languages resonating in it.

Some contributions in this issue come from IWP’s working range: Marie-Louise Bibiche Mumbu’s story appeared on our radar in the wake of a reading tour in Kinshasa, while Ronny Someck, whose quick and light hand shows up in both his graphic and verbal sketch work, and Michael Zeller, writing from India through an intimate and patient optic, are alums. The three short pieces on how war de/forms a country’s writing were commissioned for a panel at the 2014 Iowa City Book Festival.

Meanwhile, Marguerite Feitlowicz’s uncanny re-tuning of voices, Naveed Alam in a ‘call and response’ with a 16th century Punjabi poet, and Mark Burrows, giving us another translation from Rilke's "Sonnets,' all use the warp and woof of English to draw in the sound and life of other languages. Which is also the plot of the two novels, English and Foreign Words, reviewed by Ania Spyra. Adrienne Dreyfus’ poetry, in the original and then in Noirot and Simpson’s translation, is just plain beautiful. Enjoy.