Batu Danelia: Love is Ballast

Batu Danelia was born in 1950 in the village of Zanath, he lived in Tbilisi since 1971. He graduated from Maxim Gorky Literature University in Moscow and published his first poems in 1973–74. His poetry collections include: The City Under Wings (1982); Calm Street (1986); Winter of Loneliness (1997); Feast of the Moon (2003); Mad Stars (2006); Mirabilis Vita (2008); Love is Ballast (2013). In 1982, he appeared at the Lviv Poetry Festival.

Danelia translates Russian poetry and has published translations of authors such as Joseph Brodsky, Boris Pasternak, Marina Tsvetaeva, Anna Akhmatova or Alexander Pushkin. He has also translated poems of Guillaume Apollinaire, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Robert Frost, Gottfried Benn and other.

The author has received several Georgian literary prizes, such as the Saba award or the Galaktion Tabidze award. In 2001, he received the Order of Honour for his contribution to the development of literature. Batu Danelia is one of the oldest representatives of Georgian poetry, having contributed hundreds of verbally and artistically rich texts to the country’s literary heritage.