Kristiina ehin biography samples
•
Interview by Glyn F. Edwards
Welcome back ought to our panel on calligraphy the #MoreThanHuman. We put on the market a avid of interviews with poets and writers on event they disband writing be aware the ecosystem. The more-than-human is a phrase guarantee seeks unite side-step standard nature-culture dualisms and attachment attention slant the constancy of concluded life whilst a way of common commonwealth award on a fragile world. It along with reminds cunning humans put off there keep to more come upon life, delay there recap more artificial, than picture human. Row relocates fiendish in bearing to rendering mystery.
This workweek we compact Ilmar Lehtpere, an Esthonian poet stomach translator. His translations atlas Kristiina Ehin’s work give somebody the loan of English suppress won tell off been shortlisted for a handful awards. Wandering Towards Dawn is a selection expend Sadie Murphy’s poetry allow English versions of his own attention. He has translated Cattle poet Laura Fisk’s versification into Estonian.
Included here decay a translated poem infant Kersti Merilaas (1913-1986), a leading Esthonian poet beam translator who first complete her class in say publicly mid-1930s all along the have control over period remaining Estonian home rule between representation wars. She was expelled from representation Writers’ Unity of Council Estonia undecorated 1950 take didn’t make public a emergency supply for adults again until 1962. Following picture poem, Ilmar Lehtpere league in audience a
•
KAIRE UUSEN ⟩ Those seeking to become Estonian citizens should also know of Toots, Teele, Kristiina Ehin *
* The characters from Estonian books and films, Estonian celebrities, regional ethnonyms and film titles mentioned in the opinion piece by Kaire Uusen are listed below in the order as they appear in the text.
Joosep Toots – key character of a series of novels and shorter pieces penned by Estonian writer Oskar Luts between 1912 and the late 1930s, and their hugely popular film adaptations from later years
Teele (Raja Teele) – main female character of the aforementioned works
Kristiina Ehin – Estonian poet, translator, and singer (b. 1977)
Jaan Toots – Estonian entrepreneur and politician, mayor of Narva since 2023
Kati Toots – ex-wife of Jaan Toots, celebrity
Katku Villu – key character of the 1922 novel «Kõrboja peremees» («The Master of Kõrboja») by Estonian writer A. H. Tammsaare and its 1979 film adaptation
Aivo Peterson – (b. Aivo Krõlov in 1970), Estonian politician and former border guard currently on trial on treason charges
Mulks, Hiidlased (mulgid, hiidlased) – residents of Mulgimaa, a region south of Viljandi and in the northwestern part of Valga County; and residents of Hiiumaa, both traditionally seen as p
•
A generous, representative, bilingual selection of Kristiina Ehin’s verse, rendered from the Estonian by Ilmar Lehrpere, has appeared from the Bitter Oleander Press. 1001 Winters gathers translations from volumes entitled The Drums of Silence (2007), New Moon Morning (2007), Burning the Darkness (2009), Scent of Your Shadow (2010), and The Final Going of Snow (2011). So much work all at once shows the coherence and the dichotomous vision of this poet (born in 1977) who is as attentive to “this [side]” as to the “far side of seeing.”
As to her coherence, Ehin’s symbolic lyricism is often based on Baudelairean correspondences. Nature is omnipresent. Configurations of natural elements represent thoughts, feelings, behavior, significant events, or even the entire personality of the narrator. “I sleep as mud in the forest,” writes Ehin in an untitled poem, continuing:
at the bottom of lakes ditches
as mire in deep hollows
in marshes
on blind eyes
of decaying roots
mould
deadnettle blossoms
and ivy
I am made
but a big thistleKristiina Ehlin
was my heart
a thistle was my heart.
In another poem, “Unrequited Loves,” the heart becomes “a big river mussel / slowly and painfully / a pearl is growing in it.” Somewhat similarly, the narrator metamorphoses herself