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A longtime scholar, translator, and promoter of Ukrainian literature reflects on the existential crisis confronting Ukraine—and the West—today.
In Pavl…
Current Events
February 24, 2022
September 22, 2021Photo by Connie Smothermon In the lead-up to National Punctuation Day (September 24), we asked writers and translators to comment on their favorite mark of punctuation.…
February 22, 2021On a visit to an Oklahoma City bookstore, Alex Crayon finds more than books. When I pulled into the snow-covered parking lot of Nappy Roots Books in northeast Oklahoma City, the first thin…
November 26, 2019Photo by mini_malist / Flickr After every right-wing act of violence we hear once more that it was a “lone wolf” attack. Esther Dischereit argues that this is an implausible cover-up of a…
October 29, 2019© Photo by LAFD / Flickr Following the first Public Safety Power Shutoff, a writer living in Northern California reflects on what she prepared to take with her should, power shutoff notwi…
May 24, 2018Courtesy of Flickr / PalestineRemembered.comIt is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of con…
November 7, 2017One of the benefits of high-level literary prizes like the Neustadt International Prize for Literature, the Nobel Prize in Literature, the Man Booker Prize, the Man Asian Literary Prize, and others is…
February 6, 2017Geoff Livingston, “America Is a Land of Immigrants,” Dulles International Airport, January 28, 2017Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal used to say that he drew his worldview from a dry cleaner’s slip he came…- March 31, 2015UPDATE: PRAESA (Project for the Study of Alternative Educations) has received the 2015 ALMA award. Watch the videos below to see the announcement and to learn more about this organization in South Afr…
December 1, 2014Photo by Catherine Hélie / Courtesy Editions GallimardBefore he was named winner of the 2014 Nobel Prize in Literature, Patrick Modiano had already received many awards: ten or twelve of them, includi…
August 4, 2014Photo by M./Flickr Today on the phone,first time in thirty years,my friend didn’t know me.Who? Where do you live?Where did we meet?She’s been slipping for a while.I wonder if that’s how God feels…- March 25, 2014The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (ALMA) is one of the world's largest awards for children's and young adult literature, and it is given annually to a single laureate or to several. Authors, illustra…
January 27, 2014Barricade with the protesters at Hrushevskogo street on January 26, 2014 in Kiev, Ukraine. Photo Sasha Maksymenko/FlickrThe movement is precisely about what Nadya, the…
January 27, 2014As a follow-up to our post “Protesting on the Square in Kiev” on December 11, 2013, we received the letter below from Yuri Andrukhovych, who is on the front lines of the protests…
December 11, 2013Protesters in Kiev on December 9th. Photo by Ivan Bandura/FlickrEditorial note: In solidarity with the protesters in Ukraine, WLT offers the following selections by…
September 26, 2013Two University of Oklahoma faculty from the College of International Studies will appear on OETA (COX 14) discussing the current crisis in the Middle East on Sunday, September 29, at 1 p.m.Joshua Land…
August 14, 2013Ismail KadareI should hate Ismail Kadare. I should hate him because I am Macedonian, and he is Albanian, and our two peoples have been enemies for centuries and went to war as recently as a dozen year…- May 30, 2013Recent issues of WLT have featured Tahmima Anam (Bangladesh), Marina Carr (Ireland), and Julia Franck (Germany) on the cover.Two weeks ago, in a post on Words Without Borders, Alison…
May 12, 2013In honor of Mother’s Day, we’ve compiled a list of recent literature that explores mothers of all sorts: good, bad, deceased, new, and even a little on the crazy side. One thing’s for sure: thes…
May 3, 2013"We have a Cold War on the Russian soul," said Mikhail Shishkin. Lines are drawn, barricades are up. On one side are the nationalists and isolationists who proclaim …
April 30, 2013Bravery comes in many forms. As Salman Rushdie said to me in an interview, and confirmed at the opening night of PEN World Voices Festival of International Li…
April 17, 2013Tomorrow is National Poem in Your Pocket Day, and we are providing a printable PDF of “Words” by Dana Gioia, and the download comes paired with the Spanish translation by José Emilio Pacheco. The…
April 12, 2013Have you been keeping up with the 2013 Puterbaugh Festival of International Literature and Culture? Hop on over to our website for the festival at www.puterbaughfestival.org to see photo gallerie…
February 12, 2013Photo Irina Patrascu/FlickrValentine’s Day looms. You have someone; you don’t have someone; you are caught between someones. Wherever you find yourself on the relationship spectrum, you’ll enjoy…
November 14, 2012Photo by Christopher DiltsAs a refugee from Vietnam, a country colonized by the French and then fought over by the Americans and the Soviet Union, I see the Obama presidency as spelling the end of a f…
Recent Posts
WLT’s executive director, editors, and staff all deeply mourn the passing of David L. Boren, who died on February 20, 2025. Nick Hathaway, who…
. . . I sleep early, risebefore daylight, waitwith patient stuporthe coming gray light. . . I move slowly,surreptitiously — ananimal hungry to find…
Mariana Sabino’s debut short-story collection, The Verdigris Stories, transports readers to many different countries. This collection of loosely…
Photo by ike / Adobe Stock
Boat and ReactionYou were cooking in a dim sum restaurant it worried meIn dreams we react so strangelySometimes only…
Since the moment we became readers, we have always thought that to interpret the most profound ideas of a literary work—from the multiple creations…
