With Bakhyt Kenjeev, Andrey Grtitsman, Boris Khersonsky, Tatiana Voltskaya, Nina Kossman, Eli Bar-Yahalom, Emilia Rozenshteyn, Semyon Reznik, Alex Volodarskiy, Alexander Rudkevich, Victor Fet. Film editing by Ellina Savitsky; Ilya Zmejev, consultant.
The interviewer asks three questions:
1) The debate between Slavophiles and Westerners began about two hundred years ago. Do you think this topic is related to the current catastrophe (the war in Ukraine)?
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2) Are there any Russian poems that you fell out of love with after the war began? If there are, which ones?
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3) What would you like to say to those who live in the Russian Federation and, risking their freedom, openly oppose the war?
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After the film had been created and edited, we got the news of “partial” mobilization, and the topics under discussion took on a new meaning.
Vita Shtivelman is a poet, essayist, and the founder and director of EtCetera—a club of the arts and sciences. She was born in Chernivtsi and grew up in Kazan; she emigrated to Israel in 1990 and moved to Canada in 1999. Vita is a member of the Union of Russian Writers in Israel. She received awards from different literary and cultural organizations, including the Canadian Ethnic Media Association.
“Monkey’s Excuse” is a collection of short stories and parables by Nina Kossman, bilingual author of eight books of poetry and prose, compiler of the anthology “Gods and Mortals” (Oxford University Press), artist, and translator of Tsvetaeva’s poems into English.
This collection includes poems written in 2020-2023. (Russian edition)
“The Lingering Twilight” (“Сумерки”) is Marina Eskin’s fifth book of poems. (Russian edition)
Launched in 2012, “Four Centuries” is an international electronic magazine of Russian poetry in translation.
