Ana Ristović

Ana Ristović was born in 1972 in Belgrade (Serbia), where she studied Serbian Language and Literature and Comparative Literary Studies. She has been publishing poetry since she was 18. She participated in numerous writing competitions and won several prizes, including the Branko-Radičević-Prize for the best Serbian poetry début for »Snovidna voda« (1994, tr: Dream Water). This was followed by five other collections: »Uže od peska« (1997, tr: Rope of Sand), »Zabava za dokone kćeri« (1999, tr: The Scattering of the Idle Daughters), »Život na razglednici« (2003, tr: A Picture Postcard Life), »Oko nule« (2006, tr: Around Zero) and »P.S.« (a selection of her poetry, 2009). Ana Ristović won the Hubert-Burda-Prize for young Eastern European poetry in 2005. In the same year she was awarded a resident scholarship by the Literary Colloquium in Berlin.

»I have always been convinced that every light becomes more distinctive thanks to the shadows it includes. For example, there is something especially gripping and at the same time shattering about looking at those pictures which combine light and beauty with their impending demise«, says Ristović. In her poetry observations become pictures, pictures become mirrors, and mirrors become self-portraits. Her texts are open-heart surgeries, investigations of herself. In clear, sharply-defined figurative language, she provokes a confrontation with unwanted emotions which one would rather ignore, yet her poetry also transports the satisfaction which can be derived from delving into the inner riches of one’s feelings.

Her poems have been translated into numerous languages. German translations were initially published in journals like »Manuskripte«, »Akzente«, »Lichtungen« and »Schreibheft«. In addition, a collection of her poems, »So dunkel, so hell« (tr: So Dark, So Light) was published in 2007. Alongside her work as a translator from Slovenian, Ana Ristović also publishes essays and reviews. Several years she was an editor at the cultural journal »Balcanis«, which aimed to promote cultural communication and cooperation amongst the countries of south-eastern Europe. After having spent six years in Ljubljana, Ana Ristović returned to Belgrade in 2004, where she currently lives and works.