Moving Poems

A poem by Abbas Saffari, translated by the multi-talented Niloufar Talebi for her Translation Project DVD, Midnight Approaches.

Poem by Majid Naficy

Translation and video by Niloufar Talebi for The Translation Project DVD, Midnight Approaches

Poem by Abbas Saffari

Translation and video by Niloufar Talebi for The Translation Project DVD, Midnight Approaches

Last year at the Orange County Poetry Festival, Talebi discussed the translation process using this poem as an example.

Poems by A.H. Afrasiabi, translated by Niloufar Talebi

Video from The Translation Project — a scene from Icarus/Rise, “a multimedia theatrical piece based on new Iranian poetry, created, translated and narrated by Niloufar Talebi, in collaboration with choreographer and video artist Alex Ketley and composer Bobak Salehi” (text from YouTube).

The Translation Project’s page goes on to say:

Based on the poetry in BELONGING: New Poetry by Iranians Around the World, ICARUS/RISE is inspired by the Iranian spoken word tradition of Naghali, which is practiced in the streets, cafes, public rituals, or ‘art music’ stage. By giving this spoken word tradition new content (new poetry in BELONGING) — rather than its usual content of classical Persian poetry and myths — and fusing it with western theatrical elements, ICARUS/RISE gives voice to hybrid-Iranians, reflecting their experience in contemporary society.

Poem by Saghi Ghahraman, translated from the Farsi by Niloufar Talebi — read it here

Video created by The Translation Project and Invision Productions for the DVD, Midnight Approaches
Narration by Niloufar Talebi
Dance by Larissa Verduzen
Percussion by royal hartigan

I discovered this organization and its very fine videos completely by accident last night — just doing keyword searches on YouTube. It’s not entirely clear who the performers are on this particular film; the credits for the DVD as a whole are at the bottom of this page.

Iran has one of the richest poetry traditions in the world, so I’m very pleased to be able to feature some contemporary Iranian poets here, thanks to The Translation Project.