Ellen Elias-Bursać

Book Review: “The Butcher’s Trail” — A Masterful Account of Tracking Down Balkan War Criminals

January 18, 2016
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Anybody who has the good sense to pick up a copy of this book will find it instantly fascinating.

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Book Review: In “Europe in Sepia,” Croatian Writer Dubravka Ugrešić Bets a Few Chips on the Future

July 8, 2014
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Translator David Williams has hit upon a judicious combination of snappy repartee and dark underbelly that communicates essayist Dubravka Ugrešić’s rapier wit and black despair in equal measure.

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Book Review: “Lessons from Sarajevo” — Talking About What War Means

October 22, 2013
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In this powerful book, Jim Hicks explores a collection of narratives about the experience of war in many genres and a wide range of media that eschew the sentimental.

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Poetry Review: Translucent Translations — “Wheel with a Single Spoke”

September 26, 2012
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Nichita Stănescu is one of the poets who broke through the socialist-realism sound barrier and propelled Romanian poetry into new spheres.

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Book Review: The Print-Pantheist — Cyprian Norwid’s “Poems”

February 21, 2012
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In light of the many translations of Cyprian Norwid’s verse into English, Danuta Borchardt thought carefully about what she was going to focus on.

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Book Review: “Animalinside” — Exploring the Cosmic Intersection Between Painting and Prose

August 5, 2011
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There is an almost Biblical resonance of utter destruction and an improbable, fervid humor in the prose of ANIMALINSIDE as the beast speaks directly to us, its voice moving between trapped panic, cunning hunger, and a vicious savagery.

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Arts Commentary: Translating at the War-Crimes Tribunal in The Hague

June 24, 2011
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“There were times when I felt as if I were perpetually stuck, like in that film, ‘Groundhog Day,’ in the spring of 1992 just as Bosnia was careening into conflict. At one point I went to Sarajevo to visit friends and was relieved, indeed surprised, to find that while I had been re-living the war over and over, the city was gradually rebuilding and leaving the war behind.”

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