2013 Sozopol Fiction Seminars Call for Applications

Bulgarian Writer Zachary Karabashliev and Steve Wingate discuss the pleasures of semi-autobiographical fiction and the pain of trying to laugh in a foreign language.

In 2009 I attended the second annual Sozopol Fiction Seminars, sponsored by the Elizabeth Kostova Foundation and held each May on the Black Sea coast of Bulgaria. I lost my sunglasses in the sea, which the Bulgarians told me meant I had to return.
This year I did go back, and most things have remained [...]

strong>Reminder: There are still a few days left to apply for the 2012 Sozopol Fiction Seminars. This year marks the fifth anniversary of the Seminars, which take place each year in the historic, seaside town of Sozopol, on Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast. Famed fiction writer, essayist, journalist, and naturalist Barry Lopez will be the distinguished [...]

Step two: engage. Sozopol coverage continues with Molly Antopol’s conversation with Bulgarian author Miroslav Penkov and Lee Kaplan Romer’s meditation on writing as an act of defiance and grace.

Step One: Leave home. Three fellows from the Sozopol Fiction Seminar consider questions of travel, culture, and translation. Part I: John Struloeff on international diplomacy and collaboration, Jane E. Martin on finding home abroad, and Michael Hinken on how we rediscover home by leaving it. Later this week: Molly Antopol and Lee Romer Kaplan.