Fatos Arapi is an Albania

Albania

Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...

n poet, short story writer, translator and journalist, laureate of the Struga Poetry Evenings

Struga Poetry Evenings

Struga Poetry Evenings is an international poetry festival held annually in Struga, Republic of Macedonia. During the several decades of its existence, the Festival has awarded its most prestigious award, the Golden Wreath, to some of the most notable international poets, including: Mahmoud...

 Golden Wreath Award for 2008.

Biography

Born in 1930 in the village of Zvërnec

Zvërnec

Zvërnec is a community in Vlorë District. It is situated northwest of the city of Vlorë.Zvërnec, together with nearby Nartë, is a Greek-speaking pocket in the area north of Vlorë. The surrounding region is full of salt marshes...

 near Vlorë

Vlorë

Vlorë is one of the biggest towns and the second largest port city of Albania, after Durrës, with a population of about 94,000 . It is the city where the Albanian Declaration of Independence was proclaimed on November 28, 1912...

, he studied economics in Sofia

Sofia

Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...

, Bulgaria

Bulgaria

Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

 from 1949 to 1954, then started to work as a journalist in Tirana

Tirana

Tirana is the capital and the largest city of Albania. Modern Tirana was founded as an Ottoman town in 1614 by Sulejman Bargjini, a local ruler from Mullet, although the area has been continuously inhabited since antiquity. Tirana became Albania's capital city in 1920 and has a population of over...

. He soon made a name for himself as a poet, and went on to work as a researcher for the History and Philology Department of Tirana University. He now lives in Tirana.

Characteristics of his poetic work

Never fearing innovation, despite the cultural isolation of his country, Arapi has been a pioneer of free verse and experimental poetry in 1960s Albanian literature. Born on the seaside, the maritime universe has always inspired his verses, as has Albania's troubled history. He has also written meditative poetry, love poems and elegies, with the eternal questions on life and death as a recurrent theme.

Translation work

He translated into Albanian the works of poets such as Sapho

Sapho

Sapho may refer to:*Sapho , a French singer*Sapho , novel by Alphonse Daudet*Sapho , 1897 opera by Jules Massenet, based on Daudet's novel*Sapho , 1851 opera by Charles Gounod...

, Pablo Neruda

Pablo Neruda

Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

 and Nikola Vaptsarov

Nikola Vaptsarov

Nikola Yonkov Vaptsarov was a Bulgarian poet, communist and revolutionary. Working most of his life as a machinist, he only wrote in his spare time. Despite the fact that he ever published only one poetry book, he is considered one of the most important Bulgarian poets...

. He was the editor-in-chief of two anthologies: Songs of the Peoples and Antology of Turkish Verse.

Poetry

• Shtigjet poetike (Poetic Paths) 1962
• Poema dhe vjersha (Poems and Verses) 1966
• Ritme të hekura (Rhythms of Iron) 1968
• Më jepni një emër (Give Me A Name), 1972 (later banned by Enver Hoxha
  Enver Hoxha
  Enver Halil Hoxha was a Marxist–Leninist revolutionary andthe leader of Albania from the end of World War II until his death in 1985, as the First Secretary of the Party of Labour of Albania...
  
  's regime)
• Gloria victis,1997
• Eklipsi i endrrës (Solar Eclipse) 2002

Short stories

• Patate e egra (Sour Potatoes)1970
• Dikush më buzëqeshte (Someone Smiled At Me) 1972
• Gjeniu pa kokë (Headless Genius) 1999

Plays

• Partizani pa emër (The Anonymous Partisan) 1962
• Qezari dhe ushtari i mirë Shvejk (Caesar and the Good Soldier Švejk) 1995