Rolex Arts Festival - Public Talk: The House of Names

Rolex mentor Colm Tóibín will discuss with Greek poet Dionysis Kapsalis the ancient Greek tradition and its relevance in modern artistic production.

Speaker: Colm Tóibín, Literature mentor 2018 - 2019
Irish novelist, short-story writer, essayist, playwright, poet, journalist and critic, Colm Tóibín published his first novel, The South, in 1990. It was followed by works including The Blackwater Lightship (1999), The Master (2004), Brooklyn (2009, winner of the Costa Novel of the Year award), The Testament of Mary (2012), Nora Webster (2014), House of Names (2017) and The Magician (2021). His literary studies include On Elizabeth Bishop (2015). Tóibín has received the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (2006), the Irish PEN Award for Literature (2011) and the Hawthornden Prize (2015). He teaches at Columbia University and was appointed Chancellor of Liverpool University in 2017. Colm Tóibín mentored Colin Barrett in 2018-2019.

Speaker: Dionysis Kapsalis
Dionysis Kapsalis was born in Athens, Greece, in 1952. Studied Literature in the U.S.A. and in London. Worked as Director of the Cultural Foundation of the National Bank of Greece (1999-2021) and is currently employed as Literary Advisor to the Athens Epidaurus Festival. He has published poems, essays, and various translations of poetry. He has translated Shakespeare, Samuel Beckett and others for the Greek stage. He holds an honorary Doctorate from the University of Thessaloniki (2015), and has been awarded the Greek State Prize for literary translation Hamlet (2015), the Grand Prize for Letters (2017) and the Greek State Prize for Poetry (2021).

This talk will be in English with simultaneous Greek interpretation.

Presented by Rolex in partnership with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC)

Full Rolex Arts Festival program