(poet, fiction writer, journalist, librettist, playwright; b. 1960, Greece) has left few literary stones unturned. A novelist, poet, playwright, translator, and journalist, Mr. Stamatis is the author of five novels and five collections of poems, numerous translations and magazine articles, two opera librettos, and two plays. His most recent works are the novel Theseus Street (2003) and the poetry collection The Closer I Get the More the Future Gets Away (2004). Mr. Stamatis worked as a writer for the 2004 Olympic Games, and is currently the chief editor for foreign literature for the Metaixmio Publishing House. He has also worked as an architect. Mr. Stamatis is participating courtesy of the Greek Fulbright Commission.
2004 Resident
fiction writer, journalist, playwright, poet
2004 Resident
editor, fiction writer
is a prize-winning short-story writer, whose work has also appeared in German, Hungarian, Polish, Spanish, Slovenian and English. His second book, Hunters & Gatherers (2001), was the prose bestseller of the year in Slovakia, garnering considerable media attention; it was published in a Czech translation in 2003 by Odeon, followed by a German edition. His third book, the novel, The Final Hit, appeared last year. He is participating courtesy of the Department of State.
2005 Resident
editor, fiction writer, journalist
debuted in 2000 with The Days of Shaytaan, a novel depicting the void between emigrant parents and their westernized children, and has since written many short stories, including "Little Hamid," which won the El Hizjra Literary Prize. His most recent work, "Nobody has a Program for the Concert of Life," appeared in a collection of short stories from leading Dutch writers. He is writing a commissioned script for a film about derailed youth. He is participating courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer
first participated in the IWP in 1994. In his home country he is respected for his willingness to confront Austria’s past in writing that contemplates the last world war’s effects on Europe’s current social and political forces. Opernball (1995), a best-seller in Germany, was translated into thirteen language and adapted for television. A subsequent novel, Das Vaterspiel, portrays Holocaust survivors and perpetrators living in the United States. Currently professor of Literary Aesthetics at Leipzig University, he participates courtesy of Austrian Cultural Forum, and generous donations to the IWP Writers Fund.
2005 Resident
fiction writer
. Mr. Liu ’s work exposes society’s bleak side in the fashion of the great writers of the realist tradition. His works are mostly novella-length, the best known of which, Fuxi Fuxi (1987) was adapted into the motion picture Ju Dou. Three novellas were published in English in the volume The Obsessed (Beijing, 1991). His novel, Hei de xue was translated into English as Black Snow (Atlantic Press,1993), and made into an eponymous feature film; Green River Daydreams was published by Grove in 2001. His latest work, adapted for television, is a long novel titled Pinzui zhang damin de xingfu shenghuo (‘The Happy Life of Chatter-box Zhang Damin’). He participates courtesy of the Freeman Foundation.
2005 Resident
editor, fiction writer
lives in Antwerp. She is a part time lecturer of English literature at the Catholic University of Brussels and a writer of novels and short stories. She also reviews contemporary English language fiction for Dutch and Flemish newspapers. On August 27, 2005 her new novel, The True Story of Clara and Victor Rooze, will be published to coincide with her fiftieth birthday. She participates courtesy of Vlaams Fonds voor de Letteren/Flemish Literature Fund.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, translator
has translated more than forty English titles into Korean, including Raymond Carver’s What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Lee Chang-Rae’s Aloft, Nicholson Baker’s Fermata, and Germaine Greer’s The Boy. After publishing his novel A Man who Barely Exists (1997) and the collection Black Chain Stories (1998) he received the Dongseo Literary Award in 1999. In the last five years, he has published four more collections of stories, a novella, and two novels, and taught creative writing at Korea’s Seongsin University. He is participating courtesy of Korea Literary Translation Institute.
2005 Resident
editor, fiction writer
is the IWP’s first writer from Kazakhstan. She studied Russian philology at Almaty State University and English philology at the Kazakh State University of Foreign Languages. She is an editor at Cosmo Kazakhstan magazine, and contributes short stories to Apolinary magazine. She participates courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer
earned a Ph.D. in English Literature from Ain Shams University, Cairo. She has served as a lecturer in English literature at Suez Canal University, and as a language instructor, at Cairo University. In 1995, Ms. Prince traveled to the TESOL Institute at St. Michael College in Vermont, courtesy of a Fulbright Scholarship. Her work includes two selections of short stories, Shortsightedness and The Last Piece of Clay, and the novel Three Suitcases for Traveling. She has published essays on writing in Egyptian and other Arab newspapers and literary magazines. At work on a new novel, she is partcipating courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer
. A graduate of the Lu Xun Academy in Beijing, Ms. Chi has published over 30 books. Her work presents the time-honored practices of her northern village of Mona from a feminist perspective. At the same time, in novels such as [Silver Plates], [The River Rolls By] and [Beloved Potatoes], she weaves fragments of the old and new to show a rapidly changing country. Little of her writing has been translated into English, beyond a short story collection, Figments of the Supernatural, which won the 2004 Suspense-Sentence Fellowship from the James Joyce Foundation in Australia. She is participating courtesy of the Freeman Foundation.
2005 Resident
fiction writer
, the son of an Iraqi Kurd father and a German mother, grew up in Berlin but often visited Iraq for extended periods of time, impressions of which influence much of his work. His first novel, Im Grenzland ('At the Borderline'), is the story of a smuggler operating in the border triangle between Iraq, Iran, and Turkey. The book won the 2001 Aspekt Prize, which recognizes the best German debut novel. His subsequent works, Donnie and Onkelchen, continue to explore the bitter tension, displacement, and violence he observed in the Middle East. He participates courtesy of generous donations to the IWP Writers Fund.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer
. His collections of short stories, Trece Circos Comunes (‘Thirteen Common Circuses’), De Ciertos Animales Tristes (‘Of Certain Sad Animals’), and Las Mejores Familias (‘The Best Families’) are ranked among the most innovative pieces of Colombian literature in recent decades. In Zanahorias Voladoras (‘Flying Carrots’) he breaks from folkloric tradition and offers an honest account of his country’s political scene. He is also the co-author of a non-fiction book titled Contar Cuentos a los Niños (‘Telling Stories to the Children’), and writes for magazines such as Escala, Soho, and Gatopardo. He participates courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, playwright
won the Caine Prize for African Writing in 2003 for “Weight of Whispers,” a story told from the perspective of a Rwandan fleeing after the 1994 massacres. She has written several screenplays, such as Kit Luanda, Shadows of Silence, and Bokor’s Drum; her short stories include “My Mother, My Muse” and “The State of Tides.” She serves as the Executive Director of the Zanzibar International Film Festival, a non-profit organization that showcases Indian Ocean arts and culture through the ZIFF Festival of the Dhow countries. She is participating courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, poet, translator
, lecturer in English and psychology at the Lalit Multiple Campus, is also also a clinical therapist and counselor for trafficked women, and the author of Kehi Maya, Kehi Paridi ('Some Love, Some Limits'), Manju Kanchulika Katha ('Stories by Manju Kanchuli', alongside other volumes of short stories. The poems in her collections Two Sisters and 'My Life My World' and 'Inside & Outside Eyelids', bypass the traditional modes in their layered readings simultaneously of men's exploitative power and abuse and of women's thwarted desire. Ms. Kanchuli is participating courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, publisher
. A co-founder of the union of freelance journalists, she was banned from writing in 1994, succeeding nonetheless in completing a black book on corruption in the Suharto regime. Her debut novel Saman (1998) treats freely love and sexuality, and addresses the difficult relationship between Muslims, Christians and the Chinese minority. It received the prize for the best Indonesian novel in 1998, with a companion novel Larung coming out in 2001. Both have been published in Dutch. Since 1998 Utami has been a radio host and co-publisher of the cultural magazine Kalam. She participates courtesy of the Freeman Foundation.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer, poet, translator
studied comparative literature at the University of Skopje, then earned a Ph.D. in Romanian literature from the University of Bucharest, where she taught Macedonian language and literature. Now she lives in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Her books of poetry include The Offspring of the East, The Fire of Letters, Bitten Nails, and Nobel vs. Nobel., and an edited anthology of recent Macedonian poetry. Her first novel, Candid Camera, won the “Stale Popov” award for best prose work. In 2006 Ugly Duckling Presse (New York) will publish a selection of her poetry. She is participating courtesy of CEC/ ArtsLink. Photo: G.Gross Dimkovska.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, translator
received an M.A. in English from Eötvös Loránd University, where he now teaches courses on the English novel and the theory of literary translation. While working as a jazz musician, Mr. Pék wrote short stories for such Hungarian publications as Holmi, Liget, Magyar Napló, Jelenkor, and Újforrás. He has published two collections, Barátok és egyéb utánfutók ('Friends and Other Accessories') and Elbújik a fénybe ('Hiding in the Light'); his more than thirty translated titles from the English include Bill Bryson’s Notes from a Big Country and Paul Auster’s Oracle Night. He participates courtesy of the Hungarian American Enterprise Scholarship Fund.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, poet
(pen name of Estabraq Alfaraj) After graduating from law school, Ms. Alfaraj became an investigator at the Ministry of the Interior. She also joined a writers’ league and attended seminars, both of which enabled her to begin publishing articles in newspapers and magazines. In 2004, her short story "Darkness of the Light" won first place in a competition sponsored by the prominent Kuwaiti writer Lila Al-Othman. Ms. Alfaraj continues to work at the ministry.
2005 Resident
fiction writer, translator
received her B.A. in history and comparative literature at Hebrew University this year. She works for an Israeli-Palestinian NGO, ‘Windows,’ whose educational and cultural programs aim to promote understanding, and reconciliation between the people from both nations. She is a translator for Windows’ bi-lingual youth magazine, and contributes articles to the book supplement of Ha’aretz newspaper and the literary journal Ma’ayan. She is writing a novel about life in Jaffa. She participates courtesy of the US Department of State.
2005 Resident
fiction writer
is an assistant professor of Spanish at Loyola University in New Orleans. His scholarly work spans several fields including Central American and Caribbean literatures, cultural studies, popular culture, and gay and lesbian studies. His previous publications are the novella “Si trina la canaria” (1999) and four short story collections entitled Ese día de los temblores (1985), El atardecer de los niños (1990), Larga vida al deseo (1996) and Lejos, tan lejos (2004) for which he received the 2005 Ancora national award in Costa Rica. His novel El gato de sí mismo will come out in November 2005. Quesada is currently completing a book on Central American detective fiction.
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