Erica Johnson Debeljak (born 1961) is an American-Slovenian writer and translator, an American expatriate living in

Slovenia Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia, is a country in Central Europe. It borders Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the south and southeast, and a short (46.6 km) coastline within the Adriati ...

Life

Erica Johnson was born in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. She studied in New York City, where she received a degree from financial economics and French literature. In early 1990s, she followed her later husband, Slovene poet

Aleš Debeljak Aleš Debeljak (25 December 1961 – 28 January 2016) was a Slovenian cultural critic, poet, and essayist. Biography Debeljak was born in the Slovenian capital Ljubljana, then part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, to a family wi ...

, and moved from U.S. to Slovenia. They had three children together. She lives in

Ljubljana {{Infobox settlement , name = Ljubljana , official_name = , settlement_type = Capital city , image_skyline = {{multiple image , border = infobox , perrow = 1/2/2/1 , total_widt ...

Work

From 1987 to 1993, she worked as a financial analyst at the French government-owned

Banque Nationale de Paris Banque nationale de Paris () was a major French bank. It was formed in 1966 through the merger of Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris (CNEP, est. 1848) and Banque nationale pour le commerce et l'industrie (est. 1932). In 1999, it merged with ...

and as lender to the major

Wall Street Wall Street is a street in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs eight city blocks between Broadway (Manhattan), Broadway in the west and South Street (Manhattan), South Str ...

firms. After moving to Slovenia, she has worked as a translator and columnist for local newspaper

Delo ''Delo'' () is a business oriented online media in Ukraine, belonging to ekonomika+ media holding. ''Delo'' was the first daily in Ukraine, publishing its real print circulation (13.000 - 15.000) and trying to introduce Western editorial and b ...

. Her essays and stories have also appeared in ''U.S. News & World Report'', ''Glimmer Train'', ''Prairie Schooner'', ''The Missouri Review'', ''Nimrod'', ''Epoch'', ''Common Knowledge'', and ''Eurozine''. ''Barren Harvest: The Selected Poems of

Dane Zajc Dane Zajc () (26 October 1929 – 20 October 2005) was a Slovenian poet and playwright. He served as president of the Slovene Writers' Association (1991–1995), and was awarded the prestigious Prešeren Award for lifetime achievement (1981). T ...

'', she translated in 2004, was published by White Pine Press. She has published a number of books both in Slovenian and English, including two memoirs (''Foreigner in the House of Natives'' and ''Forbidden Bread''), a biography of

Srečko Kosovel Srečko Kosovel () (18 March 1904 – 26 May 1926) was a Slovenian poet, now considered one of central Europe's major modernist poets.

titled ''Srečko Kosovel: Pesnik in jaz'', and a novel ''Anti-Fa cona''.Forbidden Bread
, ''North Atlantic Books Review''

Awards

* 2007 Family Matters Award

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Debeljak, Erica Johnson 1961 births Living people Writers from San Francisco American expatriates in Slovenia 21st-century American translators English–Slovene translators American women writers 21st-century American women American columnists American women columnists Slovenian columnists Slovenian women columnists