Nadia Mifsud (born 1976) is a Maltese poet, novelist and trilingual literary translator living in France. She is Malta's third poet laureate.
Career
Mifsud has written in both Maltese and French.
She has cited French poets
Apollinaire
Guillaume Apollinaire (; ; born Kostrowicki; 26 August 1880 – 9 November 1918) was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist and art critic of Polish descent.
Apollinaire is considered one of the foremost poets of the early ...
,
Baudelaire
Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet, essayist, translator and art critic. His poems are described as exhibiting mastery of rhythm and rhyme, containing an exoticism inherited from the Romantics, an ...
, and
Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (, ; ; 20 October 1854 – 10 November 1891) was a French poet known for his transgressive and surreal themes and for his influence on modern literature and arts, prefiguring surrealism.
Born in Charleville, he s ...
as influences.
She has written on the classic themes of "love and death," as well as women's experiences, "such as mother-daughter relationships and the changes a woman’s body goes through".
She has also explored the experience of living abroad, "such as the notion of distance and the feeling of estrangement and
homesickness
Homesickness is the distress caused by being away from home.Kerns, Brumariu, Abraham. Kathryn A., Laura E., Michelle M.(2009/04/13). Homesickness at summer camp. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 54. Its cognitive hallmark is preoccupying thoughts of home ...
".
She published her first book of poetry, ''żugraga'', in late 2009.
The poems in her first book were "short, direct texts" which "
xperimentedwith typography".
By 2016, her poetry had, in her own words, "grown longer and, structurally speaking, more complex," and been translated into English, French, Spanish, Slovenian and Turkish.
In 2017, she published her first and, to date, only novel, ''Ir-rota daret dawra (kważi) sħiħa''.
The novel is influenced by conversations she had with a friend, who was dying of cancer while Mifsud was writing the book.
In 2011, she began volunteering with Inizjamed, an association she retained until at least 2023.
In 2022, Mifsud was named
Poet laureate of Malta.
Personal life
Mifsud was born in
Bormla
Cospicua (Italian) or Bormla ( Maltese, ), occasionally also known by the Latin name Cottonera, is a double-fortified harbour city in the Port Region of Malta. It served as the principal port of Phoenician Malta and, through Greek, Latin, and A ...
.
As a child, Mifsud's mother encouraged her reading, often rewarding her good behavior with books. She began writing as a child, and wrote poetry in elementary school.
Mifsud left Malta in 1998, when she was 22, and moved to France.
Mifsud married in 2002, but separated from her husband less than a year later.
Publications
Poetry
Own collections
* ''variaciones del silencio'' (2023, Festival de Los Confines, Honduras — translation by
Antoine Cassar
Antoine Christopher A. F. Cassar (born 1978 in London) is a Maltese poet and translator. His book-length poem ''Erbgħin Jum'' (Forty Days, Ede, 2017) was awarded the National Book Prize in 2018, and shortlisted for the European Poet of Freedom a ...
of ''varjazzjonijiet tas-skiet'')
*
*
*
*
Anthologies
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* ''Leħen il-Malti'' (various editions
L-Għaqda tal-Malti - Università
*
*
* ''Poetic Potatoes'' (2018, Inizjamed, Valletta 2018, Leeuwarden 2018)
* ''Voix Vives - Anthologie Sète'' (2018, Éditions Bruno Doucey)
Online journals and collections
* ''Altazor - Revista electrónica de literatura'' (February 2024 — translations by
Antoine Cassar
Antoine Christopher A. F. Cassar (born 1978 in London) is a Maltese poet and translator. His book-length poem ''Erbgħin Jum'' (Forty Days, Ede, 2017) was awarded the National Book Prize in 2018, and shortlisted for the European Poet of Freedom a ...
, curated by Khedija Gadhoum)
* ''Fragment'' (11 November 2019 — translations by Antoine Cassar, Albert Gatt, and Nadia Mifsud)
Prose
Short stories
*
Novel
*
Anthologies
*
* ''Leħen il-Malti'' (various editions
L-Għaqda tal-Malti - Università
Online journals and collections
* ''Culture 360 - ASEF, Made in Bangladesh'' (19 August 2023)
Translations
Poetry
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* ''transkrit:08'' (2016, Kulturfabrik)
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* ''Bateau Noir'' (2011, Edizzjonijiet Emma Delezio)
Prose
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Interviews
* ''Dans tes oreilles'' (2 April 2020, by Maïté Cussey, Margot Espinasse and Marion Feugère)
* ''Il faut pouvoir dire les choses'' (12/13 March 2016 by Thierry Hick)
* ''The Faraway Nearby - Nadia Mifsud'' (15 September 2015, by Teodor Reljic)
*''Would you like a book with your coffee? (20 October 2009, by Stephanie Fsadni)
''
Awards
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Mifsud, Nadia
1976 births
Living people
Maltese poets
Maltese women writers
French poets
Maltese translators
French novelists
Maltese novelists
French women writers
French translators