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Essaying Differences Proprietor, Philip Balla |
born in Glendale, California, January 4, 1947; returned to California 2001, adjuncting at Golden Gate University, San Francisco State, and City College of San Francisco.
rewriting “To the Old World” and “44 Morton Street”; new mss. on American university life: “The Waters of Kalamazoo County,” “’Love is Stronger than Hate’?” and “The Garden of Eden.” 1998 returned to U.S.: one year in Kalamazoo, Mich. (Western Michigan University and Kalamazoo Valley Community College, and substituting in public schools), a year in New York City (Zoni Language Institute), and a year in Northampton, Mass., in public schools.
all publishing deferred to manuscript work: “To the Old World” a central Europe memoir, and “44 Morton Street,” on poet Joseph Brodsky. 1987-98 in central Europe. First versions of Essaying Differences
begun at Janacek Academy of Performing Arts, Masaryk University School of Medicine, and Czech Military Academy (Brno, Czech Republic), Eotvos Lorand University (Budapest; Hungary), Safarik University (Presov, Slovakia) and Wolkerova Gymnasium (Zilina, Slovakia).
published interview by Barbora Erniholdova in Literarni Noviny, Prague, Czech Republic, March ‘96. Paper on Franny and Zooey at annual American Studies Association conference, May 4, ‘95, at Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, Hungary. Talk on BBC World Service, “Words of Faith” (on soul,
humanity, and role of universities) for fifth-year anniversary of Velvet Revolution, international broadcast Sunday, Nov. 20, ‘94. Essay, “Prekocit Hranice,” Slovak translation, Pavel Vilikovsky, on contemporary Slovak poetry in book of English translations, Not Waiting for Miracles: review in Romboid, Sept., ‘94
(Bratislava, Slovakia). Review of Slavoj Zizek’s Tarrying with the Negative: Kant, Hegel, and the Critique of Ideology, in Kritikon Litterarum, 21 (‘94). Subscription-published verse chapbook, In Central Europe, drawings by Barbora Erniholdova, Budapest, Hungary, ‘93. Paper on Hungarian poets Miklos Radnoti and
Sandor Csoori, at biannual conference of Hungarian American Studies Association, Debrecen, Hungary, Kossuth Lajos University, Jan., ‘93. Review of “The Quilt Poems” of Jane Wilson Joyce, in Quilt Pieces, and of Sad Girl Sitting on a Running Board, poems by Michael McFee, in Appalachian Journal, fall ‘92. Review of
Old Martins, New Strings, poems by Joseph Barrett, P. J. Laska, and Bob Snyder, in Appalachian Journal, summer, ‘92. Review of Invitation to Kim, poetry collection by George Scarbrough, in Appalachian Journal, fall, ‘91. “Letter from Hungary,” PN Review, England, Jul.-Aug. ‘91. Interview translated into
Hungarian by Laszlo Tabori in Uj Magyarorszag, Jul. 8, ‘91. Biographical essay on Joseph Brodsky in Literary Exile in the Twentieth Century: An Analysis and Biographical Dictionary, Martin Tucker, ed., Greenwood Press (New York, ‘91), pp. 147 – 49. Review of Sigodlin, poems by Robert Morgan, and Vigils, poems
by Jeff Daniel Marion, in Appalachian Journal, spring, ‘91. Interview in Slovak translated by Antonia Revajova, in Novy Povex Magazin, Apr. 9, ‘91. “Letter from Hungary,” in PN Review, England, Jan.-Feb., ‘91. “Open Letter to Students,” Slovak tr., Denisa Petrilakova, in Premeny, Presov, Slovakia, Dec. 21,
‘90. Essay, “Islam and the West: A World Mohacs,” translated into Hungarian by Eszter Kis, in Magyar Naplo, Budapest, Oct. 18, ‘90. Essay, “The Happy Chaos of English,” tr. Laszlo Tabori, Magyar Naplo, Budapest, Aug. 30,‘90. “Transylvania Breakdown,” essay in Appalachian Journal, fall, ’89. “Soros and Emmanuel,”
translation into Hungarian in USA, fall, ‘89. “A Message from the Grave,” review of The Poetry of Miklos Radnoti, in The Bloomsbury Review, Sept.-Oct. ’88. “Hard Times,” review of Present Continuous: Contemporary Hungarian Writing, in The New Hungarian Quarterly, summer, ’88.
1982-87 in New York City, teaching in Chinatown, then three years human rights work for PEN American Center: monthly bulletins, case sheets, press conferences, congressional hearings, missions, readings, panels, and liaison with press, NGOs, and governments.
member, National Book Critics Circle; published in Parnassus: Poetry in Review, The Chicago Tribune, Exquisite Corpse, Bloomsbury Review,
the Baltimore Sun, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, The Detroit News, USA Today, New American, Publishers’ Weekly, the St. Petersburg Times, and Freedom at Issue – an essay translated and broadcast into several countries of eastern Europe by Radio Free Europe; edited Irina
Ratushinskaya Poems (New York: PEN and Hermitage Press, ‘84); translation from Russian in The New York Review of Books. 1974-82: part-time teaching at Southwestern Michigan College, Dowagiac, Mich., New River Community College,
Dublin, Virginia, Wayne County Community College, Detroit, U of Michigan-Dearborn, and U of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
published in Appalachian Journal, Appalachian Heritage, The Picket Line, and Science for the People. Education: U of Michigan, B.A. ‘69 in history and languages: French, Russian, classical Greek, and Biblical Hebrew; M.A.
‘74 with comparative literature paper on Melville and Pasternak; Ph.D. ‘77 with autobiographical travelogue thesis, “Appalachia and Detroit.”
published in The Michigan Daily, Cinema Scope, and The Ann Arbor News
Military: 2 IX 69 – 4 IV 72 with honorable discharge as Specialist 5 Vietnamese translator-interpreter; served as congressional correspondent in Goeppingen and German-speaking Kontakt coordinator in Nuremberg, West Germany.
published in Fragging Action and Muzzle Blast also: dictionary peddler
through southern Appalachia, |
