Georgi Gospodinov (b. 1968) made his literary debut in the 1990s with the poetry collections “Lapidarium”, which won the 1992 National Prize for Best Literary Debut “Yuzhna Prolet”, and “The Cherry Tree of a Nation” (1996), which has gone through several editions.

He is also the author of the books of poetry “Letters to Gaustin”, the anthological “Ballads and Maladies”, “Where We Are Not” (2016), which has received the Bulgarian National Award “Peroto” (The Quill). His latest novel, “Time Shelter” (2020), has received the Bulgarian Novel of the Year Award by “13 Centuries Bulgaria” Foundation in 2021. His works have appeared in many international anthologies and have been translated into tens of languages, with only his “Natural Novel” having been published in over 20 languages. His second novel, “The Physics of Sorrow,” was awarded the 2016 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature in Switzerland and was the finalist for several European and US awards, including the American PEN Award for Best Translation, the Italian literary award for literature “Premio Strega Europeo”, and the German award for literature “Haus der Kulturen der Welt”. The novel has been met with critical acclaim in periodicals such as The New Yorker, Die Zeit, Liberation, etc. In 2015, Georgi Gospodinov and his daughter, Raya, co-authored the illustrated children’s book “Weddings of Animals and Things”. The animated short film “Blind Vaysha” (dir. Theodore Ushev), which was nominated for the 2017 Academy Awards, was based on a story of the same name included in Gospodinov’s first short story collection “And Other Stories” (2001).