I wrote a letter to the country of Georgia and this is what happened next …

I wrote a letter to the country of Georgia, where I have lived for 10 years in its capital, Tbilisi. I wrote about one of its most famous, yet virtually unkown poets outside of Georgia – Galaktion Tabidze.

The letter praised not only Galaktioni, but also the well-known translater and academic Professor Innes Merabishvili, who is the Head of the Chair of Translatology in the Faculty of Humanities at Tbilisi State University. She is also the President of the Byron Society of Georgia and the Principal of the Byron School of Tbilisi. She recently published a translation of Galaktion Tabidze’s poems. Galaktion Tabidze is known affectionately as Galaktioni.

My marketing expert Tamar Zhghenti contacted Innes Merabishvili. The letter was translated into Georgian by – of course – the great Innes Merabishvili, and published in the Georgian-language newspaper Republic of Georgia on 22 September 2020. It, and Innes, received hundreds of accolades.

And then, on 24 September 2020, the letter was published in the English-language newspaper Georgia Today, in which reporter Nugzar B. Ruhadze added an article.

On 25 September 2020, the Literaturuli Sakartvelo (Literary Georgia) newspaper published the letter. The Georgian-language newspaper is an arm of the Writers' Union of Georgia and deals with current literary developments about literature and artistic practices of Georgian writers.

Below are the Georgian and English versions of “Letter to Georgia.”

READ THE ARTICLE: http://georgiatoday.ge/news/22489/Once-Again-on-Galaktion-%26-Innes

MARTINA NICOLLS

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MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of: The Paris Residences of James Joyce (2020), Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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