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21/09/2021

Freedom and Identity”

Our fourth encounter brings us poets that deal primarily with questions of identity and existential issues. But you shall also discover among them theoreticians of literature, finding new meanings behind the words.

From the mountains of the Faroe Islands to the vibrant city of Tel Aviv, we bring you five languages, five cultures, five European voices looking into freedom and identity.Each poet shares their work in their consecutive languages, with translations available.

#5 Freedom and Identity

14/10 – 7PM @ Muntpunt

Place de la Monnaie / Muntplein 6, 1000 Brussels

Celebrate poetry from around Europe and have the chance to discover European cultures and much more through poetry. Hear from the following:

Beinir Bergsson, Faroe Islands – growing up so close to the sea and mountains on the isolated Faroe Islands in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean had a lot of influence on him. Since he was younger, he was drawn to poems and kept experimenting with ways to express himself. The death of his father had a significant influence on his writing and he processed it in his writings.

Kārlis Vērdiņš, Latvia – is a poet, literary theoretician, author of research papers and monographs. Vērdiņš is among the Latvian poets most often seen on international literary platforms. Among his subjects is love, sex, coming to terms with oneself, all of which he talks about with a great deal of compassion, wit, and sense of irony. One of his most touching poems, "Come to Me" was listed by the experts at the Southbank Centre among the 50 greatest modern love poems of our day.

Cornelis van der Wal, Friesland - is a Frisian writer and poet. Van der Wal has published seven poetry collections. He is webmaster for the online literary magazine Farsk, later renamed Ensafh, and was poetry critic for the Friesch Dagblad newspaper. He won the Frisian prize for best literary debut in 1993 with his first collection In nêst jonge magneten (A nest of young magnets).

Rita Kogan, Israel - is a poet, translator, and writer. She was born in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), Russia, in 1976 and immigrated to Israel in 1990. She lives in Tel Aviv. Kogan has published two poetry books. Her poems and short stories were published in the leading Israeli literature magazines and in the daily newspapers.

Ondřej Macl, Czech Republic – has a background in acting and writing, comparative literature, social work, and journalism. He devotes himself, among other things, to performances and rituals, combining various forms of art.He has performed in stadiums, hypermarkets, squats, rough pubs, universities, and churches, on the streets, at weddings, and in shelters. As an author or performer, he has performed in various festivals in the Czech Republic and abroad.

Radu Bata, Romania - is a Franco-Romanian author of various books and the inventor of the poésettes (poems without the fuss). He has traveled through time and Europe, an intermittent worker of words and dreams, the dictionary as a marshal's staff in its pouch. He survives today in his verbal ballistics lab, somewhere between the Seine and the Danube, where he comes out to say hello to the plants in his garden and shake hands with the clouds.

Please note that you need a Covid Safe Ticket for this activity. What does this mean for you?

Registration to the public event at Muntpunt is required.