Submitted by Saint Martin’s University
The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) has awarded Saint Martin’s University Associate Prof. and Dean of English Jamie Olson, Ph.D., a Literature Translation Fellowship to support his translations of the works of contemporary Russian poet Timur Kibirov.
The NEA is a federal agency that supports and funds opportunities to participate in the arts, exercise their imaginations and develop their creative capacities. Their partnerships with state and local agencies and with others in the philanthropic and cultural sectors support the artistic endeavors and the rich and diverse culture of the United States. Its Literature Translation Fellowships are primarily awarded to recipients translating works of literary excellence and value by writers who are not well represented in English translation, with the broad goal of expanding opportunities for readers to better understand other cultures and traditions.
“Dr. Jamie Olson’s colleagues in the College of Arts and Sciences are proud of him for winning the NEA Fellowship. This is a highly competitive program and the award recognizes the valuable contribution he makes in translating Russian poetry and making it accessible to a broader audience,” said Jeff Crane, Ph.D., dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.
Beginning in November, Olson will receive a grant of $12,500 for the year to assist in his work translating Kibirov’s “When Lenin Was a Little Boy: Selected Poems.” Kibirov, who lives in Moscow, has penned more than 20 poetry collections. His many honors include the “Anti-Booker” award, a Joseph Brodsky Memorial Fellowship at the American Academy in Rome, and, in 2008, Russia’s prestigious “Poet” prize. He is viewed as a gadfly who seeks to tear down Russian secular traditions, such as Marxism, nationalism and the literary canon, says Olson. Despite the poet’s stature in Russia, his works are basically unavailable in English.
“This collection will gather poems from across 30 years of his career,” Olson said. “In the late Soviet period, Kibirov was closely associated with underground poets like Lev Rubinstein, Dmitri Prigov, and Sergey Gandlevsky, and his work is often identified with postmodernism and conceptualism. Readers are drawn in by his playful reinterpretations of classic texts, including ancient myths, canonical literary works, Soviet ideology, and even scripture.”
Olson is a polished Russian translator. After serving in the U.S. Marines for six years, he pursued a degree in English at the College of Saint Scholastica, a fellow Benedictine institution in Minnesota. While there, he participated in a short study-abroad experience in Petrozavodsk, Russia, where he “was bitten by the Russian bug,” he says. Since that time, he has mastered the language and made numerous research and study trips to Russia. He also has helped establish and lead a popular study tour program between students and faculty of Saint Martin’s and those of the Karelian State Pedagogical Academy in Petrozavodsk.
On his most recent study-tour to Russia this summer, he was invited to give a talk, “Marines Love Poetry, Too: Military Service, Literary Studies, and Russian Translation,” at the American Center of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.
A member of the American Literary Translators Association, he has completed English translations of many Russian literary texts, including fiction by Dmitry Manin-Sibryak and poetry by Vyacheslav Kiktenko and Irina Yevsa. His translations have been published in several journals. He also writes a blog, “The Flaxen Wave: On Poetry, Translation, and Russian Culture.”http://flaxenwave.blogspot.com/2014/04/no-obvious-means-for-transmission.html
At Saint Martin’s, he teaches composition, contemporary poetry, post-colonial literature, exile and immigration, Russian literature and language and translation, as well as teaching interdisciplinary courses with fellow faculty members.
