We cordially invite you to an evening of poetry with readings by some of the leading poets from America, Britain and the Czech Republic. It is not often that Czech poetry books appear in the English-speaking world, which makes it all the more significant that Blue Diode Press from Scotland have brought out a collection by perhaps the greatest contemporary Czech poet, Petr Hruška, entitled Everything Indicates. The Harvard Czech Studies scholar Jonathan Bolton was responsible for the selection and translation of the poems for this book.
Petr Hruška will be presenting this book on March 20 at the Czech Centre New York, together with the founder of Blue Diode Press, the Scottish poet Rob A. Mackenzie, who will also be reading some of his own verse throughout the evening. This duo will be joined by three established New York-based poets, Jeffrey McDaniel, Rosebud Ben-Oni and Ilya Kaminsky, whose poems have also been translated into Czech. The evening will be hosted by Jan Zikmund and Rob A. Mackenzie, with Yvetta Ellerová providing musical accompaniment.
Free registration here.
This poetry event at the Czech Centre in New York is also the first stop on Petr Hruška’s American tour, which has been organized by the Czech Literary Centre. During March and the start of April the poet will be visiting five American states, and in addition to New York he’ll be appearing in cities including Chicago, Minnesota and California.
Petr Hruška will also be presenting his book Everything Indicates in other venues in New York: at Principles GI Coffee House on 21 March and at the Harriman Institute of Columbia University on 22 March (more on this event here).
Everything Indicates was published by Blue Diode Press.
Petr Hruška is a Czech poet and literary historian who lives in Ostrava. His poetry has won a number of state and international awards, including the Czech State Award for Literature in recognition of his collection Darmata (To No Travail, 2012), and the Magnesia Litera Award, the most prestigious annual literary award in the Czech Republic, for his newest collection, Spatřil jsem svou tvář (I Caught Sight of My Face, 2022), an extended meditation on Magellan’s voyage around the world. Collections of Hruška’s poetry have been published in English, French, German, Polish, Italian, Hungarian, Romanian, and Croatian translation.
Rosebud Ben-Oni is the author of several collections, including If This Is the Age We End Discovery (2021), which won the Alice James Award and was a Finalist for the National Jewish Book Award. In 2017, her poem “Poet Wrestling with Angels in the Dark” was commissioned by the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in NYC. In 2022, Paramount commissioned her video essay “My Judaism is a Wild Unplace” for a nationwide campaign. In January 2023, she performed at Carnegie Hall on International Holocaust Memorial Day, and in Autumn 2023, her poem “When You Are the Arrow of Time” was commissioned by the Museum of Jewish Heritage—A Living Memorial to the Holocaust.
Ilya Kaminsky was born in Odesa, former Soviet Union in 1977, and arrived to the United States in 1993, when his family was granted asylum by the American government. He is the author of Deaf Republic (Graywolf Press, 2019) and Dancing In Odessa (Tupelo Press, 2004) and has co-edited and co-translated many other books, including Ecco Anthology of International Poetry (Harper Collins, 2020) and Dark Elderberry Branch: Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva (Alice James Books, 2012). He holds the Bourne Chair in Poetry at Georgia Institute of Technology and lives in Atlanta.
Rob A. Mackenzie was born in Glasgow and studied law before switching to theology. He spent a year in Seoul, eight in Lanarkshire, five in Turin, and now lives in Leith. He was a review editor for Magma poetry magazine for several years and his reviews and articles on poetry have been published in many other magazines. Rob runs the Blue Diode Press and occasionally translates poems from Italian. His sixth poetry collection, Woof! Woof! Woof! was published by Salt in Autumn 2023.
Jeffrey McDaniel is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Thin Ice Olympics (Write Bloody, 2022). Other books include: Holiday in the Islands of Grief (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020), Chapel of Inadvertent Joy (Pittsburgh, 2013), The Endarkenment (Pittsburgh, 2008), The Splinter Factory (Manic D Press, 2002), The Forgiveness Parade (Manic D, 1998), and Alibi School (Manic D, 1995). McDaniel’s poems have appeared in numerous places, including The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, The New York Times, and Best American Poetry (1994, 2010, and 2019). Recipient of an NEA fellowship, he teaches at Sarah Lawrence College.
