Roy Hasan has said on blogs and in interviews that he writes for his father and his neighbours, not for poetry lovers or academia. He says his inspiration comes from New York hip-hop, especially the Wu-Tan Clan, jazz and the films of Jarmusch and Pasolini, as well as the Israeli Mizrachi singer Ofer Levi. UK poet Clare Pollard held up his poem ‘In the land of Ashkenaz‘ as one of her highlights of translating with the PTC.
Earlier this year bridge translator Micha Meyers introduced the PTC to Hasan, who from the Mizrachi group of Jews originating in the Middle East. This fascinating workshop shone a light on a cultural shift is taking place within Israel today with the Ars Poetica poetry group and other Mizrachis presenting a radical departure from the Russian, French and Anglo-Saxon literary traditions that produced Hebrew poets like Nathan Alterman and Tuvia Ruebner.
There is no need to know the language being translated, just come along!
Poet
Roy Hasan was born in Hadera in 1983, a Mizrachi, lower-class development town. He was a cook during his military service and in civilian life afterwards. His work was not intended from the outset as a rebellion against the elitist Ashkenazi, left-wing political and literary establishment, but recognised as such by the media. He received the Bernstein Prize for young writers for ‘The Dogs That Barked In Our Childhood Were Muzzled’ (2014).
Bridge Translator
Micha Meyers is a secondary level teacher and translator who lives in Hackney, London. He studied at University of East Anglia (UEA), The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the University of Groningen. He is a regular participant at the PTC’s regular Poetry Translation Workshops, this is his second workshop as guest translator
Workshop Facilitator
Edward Doegar is a poet, editor and critic based in London and the commissioning editor at the Poetry Translation Centre. His poems have appeared in various anthologies and journals, including Ten: The New Wave (Bloodaxe) and Granta. He is a consulting editor at The Rialto, a fellow of The Complete Works and was general manager of the Poetry Society between 2013 and 2017. His pamphlet, For Now, was published by clinic in 2017.
