Hosting Words at the Lent House of Literature sets up meetings between Slovene and foreign authors who share a common bond. On 6st of September, House of Literature will host Iztok Osojnik and Tom Petsinis.
Iztok Osojnik (1951, Ljubljana), is a poet, writer, essayist, translator, editor, painter, scenographer, tourist guide, mountaineer and world traveller. During his younger years he was the driving force behind numerous artistic movements and the co-founder of the anarchist “Surrealist Movement”, the art movement “Garbage Art” (Kyoto), the music movements “Papa Kinjal Band” and “Hidorigzma” as well as the co-founder of different art institutions and festivals: ŠKUC Gallery, Equrna Gallery, “Trnovski terceti” (Trnovo Terzettos), “Pogovori v vili Heberstein” (Debates at the Herberstein Villa), International Meeting of publishers at Dane, etc.
His oeuvre includes twenty poetry collections (recently Temni Julij, Nekoč je bila Amerika, Iz novega sveta and Gospod Danes) and four novels (recently Temna snov). In 2005 Osojnik published a collection of essays entitled Nasmeh Mona Lize and a collection of political essays Homo Politicus in 2006. His poems and essays were translated into eighteen languages.
Osojnik also published three poetry collections in English: Alluminations (with Marko Modic; Ljubljana, 2000), And Some Things Happen for the first Time (Toronto, 2001) and Mister Today (San Jose, 2003).
Osojnik received numerous awards and prizes (the Jenko award, the Veronika award, the Župančič award, the 2001 poetry award of the Italian region Friuli Venezia Giulia and became the 2004 Lučić laureate). In 2004 Osojnik was once again nominated for the Veronika award, with further nominations following in 2005 (the Prešeren Foundation award) and 2006 (Kresnik award).
Tom Petsinis is an Australian poet, playwright and novelist. He was born in 1953 in Greece and moved to Australia during his childhood. He studied mathematics at the Melbourne University. After serving as a high-school professor, he acquired his PhD and currently serves as professor of mathematics at the Melbourne Victoria University.
Petsinis published six poetry collections: My Father's Tools (2009), Four Quarters (2006), Naming the Number (1998), Inheritance (1995), Offerings (1994), The Blossom Vendor (1992).
He is also the author of a collection of modern parables entitled The Death of Pan (2001) as well as three novels: The Twelfth Dialogue (2000), The French Mathematician (1997) and Raising the Shadow (1992).
Petsinis was a guest of numerous festivals and international readings, including all major Australian literary festivals; the festival in Struga, Macedonia (1999); the University of Lecce in Italy; the 2000 Pordenone literary festival and the 2001 Poetry International Festival Rotterdam. He was also a guest of the Slovene Vilenica festival, the Maastricht International Poetry Nights and paid a visit to Austria in 2007.
Petsinis is the recipient of all major Australian awards for literature and the 1997 Hellenic Award of Distinction for Literature laureate. In 2009 Patsinis received the Writer-in-residence award in Lavigny, Switzerland.
http://tompetsinis.com/