Throughout this year and the next, the Goethe-Institut Chicago will be hosting literary readings for our series, Culture without Borders: Writing in Foreign Language. Every invited author lives in a different country and culture than the one in which they grew up, and they do not write in their native language. Through these readings we hope to gain a better understanding of how these authors have integrated these experiences with their writing.

The series begins with Marica Bodrozic, who was born in Dalmatia and now lives in Germany, and Samrat Upadhyay, who was born in Nepal and now lives in Bloomington, Indiana.

Marica Bodrozic was born in 1973 the former Republic of Yugoslavia. She studied Cultural Anthropology, Psychoanalysis, and Slavic Studies in Frankfurt am Main. Her first literary work was published in newspapers and magazines such as Lettre International, FAZ and Manuskripte. She is the author of poems, novels, stories and essays. Her books have received numerous honors and grants, including the Grant for Literature from the Academy of Art in Berlin. She now works as a freelance writer in Berlin.

Samrat Upadhyay is the first Nepali-born fiction writer writing in English to be published in the West. His first book, the short story collection ARRESTI NG GOD IN KATHMANDU (2000, 2001) has been translated into French and Greek. Upadhyay’s second book, the novel THE GURUOF LOVE (2003) was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year 2003. His recent story collection, THE ROYAL GHOSTS, won the 2007 Asian American Literary Award and the Society of Midland Authors Award in fiction. He directs the Creative Writing Program at Indiana University in Bloomington.

Recorded Monday, November 10, 2008 at Goethe-Institut Chicago.