Daniel Weissbort

Daniel Weissbort was born in London in 1935. At the beginning of his studies at the University of Cambridge he met Ted Hughes, the future British Poet Laureate. In 1965 Weissbort and Hughes founded the journal »Modern Poetry in Translation«, which is still appearing today. In the early 1970s he went to America and from 1974 he directed Translation Workshops at the University of Iowa, where he was a professor of English and Comparative Literature. From 1970 to 1973 Weissbort was advisory director of English Poetry International, London, and was a member of numerous other committees, including the PEN American Center Translation Committee. Since then he has returned to England, where he writes poetry, teaches, lectures and works on the translation and popularization of Russian literature with his partner Valentina Polukhina. Weissbort is best known for his translations and anthologies of Russian and Eastern European poetry, but he is also recognized as a poet in his own right. His collection of poetry, »Letters to Ted« (2002) is dedicated to his friend and colleague of many years, Ted Hughes. In 2006, Weissbort published a book on the history of translation theory, “Translation: Theory and Practice”, with Astradur Eysteinsson.

Ted Hughes commented: »It’s hard to imagine how anything could be more natural, relaxed and true to the writer’s self, true to his secret, personal life, than Daniel Weissbort’s poems.« They are snapshots of innermost feelings. These snapshots are short and some are aphoristic, yet they provide deep insight into emotions, individual perceptions and thoughts. Private and political perspectives cross; historical developments are combined with personal events, for example when he associates the end of the Second World War in the poem »1945« with his initial successes in cricket. Weissbort converses with himself, with his ageing body as well as with his thoughts; his memories, world history, the life story of his deceased parents. Many of his poems are devoted to the topic of memories, they contain dedications to dead or lost friends. A recurring theme is that of dreams, for example the terrible moment of awaking from a nightmare whose fearful impressions linger: »And yet / for certain sins, though you wake / there is no forgiveness either«.

© international literature festival berlin

In an Emergency
Carcanet
Oxford, 1972
 
Soundings
Carcanet
Manchester, 1977
 
Russian Poetry, the Modern Period [Hg.]
University of Iowa Press
Iowa City, 1978
 
Leaseholder
Carcanet
Manchester, 1986
 
Translating Poetry: the double labyrinth [Hg.]
Macmillan
London, 1989
 
The Poetry of Survival [Hg.]
St. Martin´s Press
New York, 1991
 
Fathers
Nothern House
Newcastle, 1991
 
Nietzsche´s Attaché Case
Carcanet
Manchester, 1993
 
Periplus [Hg.]
Oxford University Press
New York, Delhi, 1993
 
What Was All the Fuss About?
Anvil

London, 1998

Letters to Ted
Anvil Press Poetry
London, 2002

Iraqi Poetry Today [Hg.]

King’s College London – University of London
London, 2003
 
From Russian with Love
Anvil Press Poetry
London, 2004
 
Contemporary Russian Women´s Poetry [Hg.]
Carcanet
Manchester, 2004

Translation: Theory and Practise (mit Astradur Eysteinsson)
Oxford University Press
Oxford, 2006

Übersetzer: Margitt Lehbert