Boris A. Novak

Boris A. Novak, a Slovene poet, playwright and translator, was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, in 1953. He is a professor of Comparative Literature and Philosophy. Novak has been a freelance writer, a dramaturg in the Slovene National Theatre in Ljubljana, and an editor of Nova revija (The New Magazine), one of the most important cultural and political magazines in Slovenia and Yugoslavia, famous for its critical views. He currently edits a literary magazine for childrenKurirèek (The Little Messenger). In 1988-89 he was a research fellow in contemporary American theatre and literature at the University of Minnesota, U.S.A.

Novak has published fifteen books, mostly poetry, including Stihozitje (Still-Life-in-Verse), Daughter of Memory, 1001 Verses (based on Arabian Nights' Entertainment), and Coronation. He has written a historical play, Soldiers of History, and a poetic comedy, House of Cards. Novak also writes for children: he has published three volumes of poetry for children (Let Us Outword Words!, Phantasy Lives Everywhere, and Periscope);he has also written many puppet, radio and television plays for children, including The Sky Theatre and The Little and the Big Moon.

He has received several art awards, among others a Prešeren fund award, the highest Slovene national art award, for his poetry.

Novak also translates modern American and French poetry (Stéphane Mallarmé, for example).

His poems and plays are translated into several foreign languages. In 1989 a volume of poems entitled Coronationwas published in the U.S.A. (Poetry Miscellany Chapbooks, University of Tennessee).