Sergey Zavyalov

Sergey Zavyalov (1958) is a Russian poet and literary scholar. In 2004, he emigrated to Finland and moved to Switzerland in 2011, and is currently teaching the history of Russian poetry at the University of Zürich. Zavyalov published his first poems in the 1980s and has published five books of poetry so far. In 2015, he won the prestigious Andrei Bely Prize. Four of his books have been translated into English, while Estonian readers can enjoy his experimental book of poetry and his first collection of essays entitled Ars poetica. The latter highlights Zavyalov’s somewhat unusual interests – for example, official Soviet poetry, which the author approaches from unexpected angles, focusing on the relationship between poetry and social currents and highlighting forgotten or ignored nuances. Thanks to his Mordvin roots Zavyalov also touches on Finno-Ugric poetry in the book. Sergey Zavyalov will perform three times at the festival: on Wednesday 24 May at 6 pm at the Russian Theatre, when he will talk to translator and poet Aare Pilv, on Friday 26 May at 7 pm at Café Wabadus and on Sunday 28 May at 1 pm at the Estonian Writers’ Union, where he will be joined by poet and translator Igor Kotjuh.