Writing Families: Belševica + Zalāns

The Andrejs Upīts Memorial Museum (Riga, Brīvības Street 38-4) invites you to a new event in the heartfelt conversation series “Writing Families” on February 13 at 6:00 PM. The participants of the Valentine's Day event will be poets Krista Anna Belševica and Kaspars Zalāns. The conversation about love in literature and everyday life will be led by Laura Tabūna.

In an interview with punctummagazine in 2022, Krista Anna Belševica admitted that “In Latvian society, it's quite difficult to talk about genuine, healthy love. We also spend so much time in our conversations talking about problems, but little about love. We only read about it quietly in novels.” K. Zalāns added: “I would really like to read a truly high-quality literary work about two people who, like any couple, argue about something in everyday life, perhaps even clash for several days, but then find some pragmatic common ground and goal, say, saving money for an apartment. One that includes all kinds of everyday expressions of affection and care. I believe someone might find it boring to the point of nausea, but I would really like to read something like that—even if only because, as a man who wants to understand more about love, I don't feel that I gain much from these narratives of overwhelming passion and obsession, which have no connection to the expressions and challenges of love I encounter and work with daily.”

Krista Anna Belševica – poet, writer, editor, and creativity coach. Author of the poetry collection “Hunting Life” (2017), the story collection “A Grey Dog Dreams of Goldfish” (2021), and the prose poetry collection “Manifestations” (2024). Her works have been translated into English, Estonian, Lithuanian, Russian, Finnish, German, and Chinese. The writer organizes literary events and readings, actively participates in poetry readings and performances.

Kaspars Zalāns – poet, translator, editor, and organizer of cultural events. In 2023, his debut poetry collection “Telegrams” was published, receiving the Jury Award of the Ojārs Vācietis Prize for design. Currently, with the support of the VKKF, his second poetry collection is in progress. He has translated the poetry of Hilda Doolittle, William Carlos Williams, Basil Bunting, and Frank O’Hara, as well as Ivan Akhmetyev, and received the “Silver Inkpot” for translations of H.P. Lovecraft's stories. He was one of the organizers of the festival “Poetry Without Borders” and has also organized the event series “Unconventional Literature” at the Kaņepes Culture Center. Some of K. Zalāns' poems have been translated into Russian and Danish.

Entrance fee: 2.00 euros.