Stanka Hrastelj

Stanka Hrastelj (1975) is a poet and writer. She has so far published two poetry collections, Gospod, nekaj imamo za vas (Sir, We Have Something for You) (Beletrina, 2009) and Nizki toni (Low Tones) (Goga, 2005), and two novels Igranje (Playing, Mladinska knjiga, 2012) and Prva dama (First Lady) (Mladinska knjiga, 2018). She has received numerous awards for her work, among others the Modra Ptica Award for best novel (2012), the title Dame of Poetry at the 2007 Poetry Tournament, the award for best debut novel (2005) and the title Best Young Poet of Slovenia (2001). Individual poems and passages of prose have been translated and published in over twenty languages. She is also author of forewords to various editions, an editor, columnist, organiser of cultural events, moderator, and creative writing tutor. She is a member of the Slovene Writers’ Association and the Slovene PEN Centre. The guiding principle in her writing is that as an author she “creates anew” with every literary work. Every time she sets herself a different literary style, tone, charge and approach, whishing her books to not be alike. She remains loyal, however, to irony, which is one of her favourite writing approaches. She is attracted by “difficult”, often taboo themes (mental illness, self-destructive behaviour, old age, suicide).

Suzana Tratnik

Suzana Tratnik (1963) studied sociology at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Ljubljana and holds a Master’s degree in gender anthropology from the Institutum Studiorum Humanitatis. She is a writer, translator, sociologist, essayist, and lesbian activist. She has published seven collections of short stories, notable among them Vzporednice (Parallels) (ŠKUC, 2005) and six novels, including Ime mi je Damjan, (My name is Damian) (ŠKUC, 2001), Norhavs na vrhu hriba (Madhouse on the Hill) (Cankarjeva založba, 2019), Ava (Mladinska knjiga, 2021), and Pontonski most (Ponton Bridge) (Beletrina, 2020). In 2007 she received the Prešeren Fund Award. Two main themes in her fiction are the marginal fates in contemporary urban life and the depiction of childhood in the Yugoslavia of the 1960s and 1970s.

Tadej Golob

Tadej Golob (1967) was born in Maribor and grew up in nearby Lenart. He went to secondary school in Maribor and played football for FC Maribor, then went to study journalism in Ljubljana, where he became involved in alpine climbing to fill the gap in his life that appeared when he stopped playing football. Both journalism and climbing led him to travelling all over the world – as a journalist he covered motorcycling and interviewed world champions on race courses, as a mountaineer he climbed walls from Meteora in Greece to the Himalaya. He was a member of the expedition that in 2000 assisted Davo Karničar in his first-ever descent on skis from the highest mountain in the world. He wrote his first book about this expedition, then began writing biographies of people he had previously interviewed for the Slovene edition of Playboy – for example the actress Milena Zupančič, Kot bi Luna padla na zemljo (As if the Moon Fell to Earth) (Beletrina, 2018). His literary debut, the novel Svinjske nogice (Pig's Feet) (Litera, 2009), won him the Kresnik Award for best novel of the year in Slovenia. In 2016 he began writing his bestselling crime novel series, starting with Jezero (The Lake) (Goga, 2016), and Leninov Park (Lenin Park) (Goga, 2018), with the sixth book in the series just published. So far, the first three books have also been adapted for TV.

Tomaž Šalamun

Tomaž Šalamun (b. 1941 in Zagreb, d. 2014 in Ljubljana), grew up in Koper, studied art history in Ljubljana, member of the OHO group, lectured at American universities, later cultural attaché at the Slovenian Embassy in New York. His poem Duma 64 (1964) caused a political provocation. Books of poetry: Poker (1966), Kdaj (When, 2011). In German: Vier Fragen der Melancholie, Edition Korrespondenzen, 2003 (tr. Peter Urban), Aber das sind Ausnahmen, Edition Korrespondenzen, 2004 (tr. Peter Urban), Ballade für Metka Krašovec, Edition Korrepondenzen, 2005 (tr. Fabjan Hafner), Lesen: Lieben, Suhrkamp, 2006 (trans. Fabjan Hafner), Rudert! Row! Edition Korrespondenzen, 2012 (trans. Gregor Podlogar and Monika Rinck), Steine aus dem Himmel, Suhrkamp, 2023 (trans. Matthias Göritz, Liza Linde and Monika Rinck) and poems in the anthology Mein Nachbar auf der Wolke; Slowenische Lyrik des 20. und 21. Jahrhunderts (Carl Hanser Verlag & Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung, 2023).

Tone Škrjanec

Tone Škrjanec (born 1953 in Ljubljana), studied sociology, teacher and journalist, from 1990 programme and poetry coordinator at the cultural centre KUD France Prešeren in Ljubljana, translator (Paul Bowles, William S. Burroughs, Charles Bukowski, Gary Snyder, Frank O'Hara), often performs together with musicians. Books of poetry include: Dihaj (Breathe, 2017), Nekaj o nas kot živalih (Something about us as animals, 2020). In German: Haut, Litterae Slovenicae, Slovenian Writers' Union, 2021 (trans. Ann Catrin Bolton) and poems in the anthology Mein Nachbar auf der Wolke; Slowenische Lyrik des 20. und 21. Jahrhunderts (Carl Hanser Verlag & Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung, 2023).

Uroš Prah

Uroš Prah (1988) has published three poetry collections, Čezse polzeči (Sliding Over Themselves) (CSK, 2012), Tišima (Phush) (CSK, 2015), nominated for the Veronika and Jenko Awards, and Udor (Landslide) (ŠKUC, 2019). For his investigative poem, Nostra Silva, written in German, he won the Exil Poetry Prize in Vienna in 2018. Translations of his books, poems, and essays have been published in fifteen countries, most recently the poetry collection Silenci(e)mpuje at Cae de Maduro in Buenos Aires (2022) and the selected poems Erdfall at Luftschacht in Vienna (2023). In 2023 two of his short stories, also in German, Die Fächer (The Shelves) and Die Überwindung der Nähe (Overcoming Proximity) were published in the Austrian magazine Literatur und Kritik. He was the writer-in-residence of the Ministry of Culture of Slovenia in New York (2019), Traduki and the Romanian National Museum for Literature in Bucharest (2019), the IHAG programme in Graz (2020), the Ulysses’ Shelter in Larissa, Greece (2021), and at the Literarisches Colloquium Berlin (2022). He was the co-founder and chief editor of the Ljubljana-based magazine IDIOT, programme director of the international Literodrom Festival in Cankarjev Dom in Ljubljana, and co-founder of the Museum of Madness, Trate. He lives in Vienna.

Uroš Zupan

Uroš Zupan (born 1963 in Trbovlje), studied comparative literature in Ljubljana, poet, essayist and translator from American (John Ashbery), Croatian and Serbian. Books of poetry, among others: Sutre (Sutras, 1991). In German: Beim Verlassen des Hauses, in dem wir uns liebten, Residenz Verlag, 2010 and Immer bleibt das Andere, Hanser Verlag 2008 (both translations by Fabjan Hafner), and poems in the anthology Mein Nachbar auf der Wolke; Slowenische Lyrik des 20. und 21. Jahrhunderts (Carl Hanser Verlag & Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung, 2023).

Veronika Simoniti

Veronika Simoniti (1967) is the author of three short story collections Zasukane štorije (Twisted Stories) (LUD Literatura, 2005), Hudičev jezik (The Devil’s Tongue) (LUD Literatura, 2011) and in Fugato (Litera, 2019), as well as novels Kameno seme (Stone Seed) (Litera, 2014) and Ivana pred morjem (Ivana in front of the Sea) (Cankarjeva založba, 2019). Her works are often nominated for awards, and Ivana pred morjem won her the 2020 Kresnik Award for best novel. She also won prizes for her work in Italy, Premio Teramo in 2001, Premio della Consulta femminile di Trieste in 2013, Premio Letterario Milano International – Premio della Critica in 2022. Her stories have been translated into several languages and have been included in Slovene and foreign anthologies, (e.g. Best European Fiction 2016). The German translation Hudičev jezik was published in the Litterae slovenicae collection in 2017 and was reprinted in 2023 by the Frankfurt publishers Axel Dielmann Verlag. The novel Ivana pred morjem has also been translated into many languages. She is also editor of the bilingal blog for Slovene-Italian literary exchange, La casa di carta – Papirnata hiša (Paper House). She lives and works in Ljubljana.

Vinko Möderndorfer

Vinko Möderndorfer (1958) is a director, playwright, poet and writer. He graduated in theatre direction at the Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television (AGRFT) in Ljubljana with a performance of Anton Chekhov’s The Proposal in 1982. In the last thirty years he has directed more than 100 theatre and opera performances, he also directs TV and radio productions. In the period from 1992 to 2010 he directed 15 TV plays and documentaries with the scripts he wrote himself. He writes dramas, poems (also for children), novellas, novels, TV and film scripts, radio plays for children and adults. He has received several awards, including the Borštnik Prize for Best Director (1986) for the performance Potujoče gledališče Šopalovič (The Šopalovič Travelling Theatre), the Župančič Prize of the City of Ljubljana (1994) for the collection of novellas Krog male smrti (Circle of Little Death) (Cankarjeva založba, 1993), and the 2000 Prešeren Fund Award for his collection of novellas Nekatere ljubezni (Some Loves) (Cankarjeva založba, 1997). He also received the first prize in the anonymous competition of Radio Slovenia and WDR (1994) for his radio play for adults Pokrajina (The Landscape), the Rožanc Prize (2002) for the best essay collection Gledališče v ogledalu (A Mirror to the Theatre) (Obzorja, 2001) and others.

Vladimir P. Štefanec

Vladimir P. Štefanec (1964) was born in Ljubljana. He graduated in philosophy and art history from the Faculty of Arts in Ljubljana. He has published twelve works of fiction, eleven novels and a thematic collection of short stories. His literary characters are characterised by the fact that they try to achieve the impossible and that they do not fit into the various life situations and systems. He has been nominated four times for the Kresnik Award (most recently for his novel Najlepša neznanka svetloba (The Most Beautiful Unknown Light) (Mladinska knjiga, 2018) and for the Desetnica Award for his young adult novel Sem punk čarovnica, Debela lezbijka in ne maram vampov (I am a Punk Witch, a Fat Lesbian and Do not Like Vampires) (Modrijan, 2015). Štefanec is an active publicist. For ten years he wrote articles, reviews and essays on world literature, then worked as an art critic for a leading Slovene daily newspaper for twenty years, contributing articles on the visual arts. He has published over 700 articles in leading Slovene media and is also a lecturer in photography theory. He lives as a freelance cultural worker in Ljubljana.