Join us for a reading with poet and translator, Mujib Mehrdad, as he sits down with esteemed faculty member, Val Vinokur, to discuss his latest work. 

Mujib Mehrdad is the author of several poetry collections, including “Gladiators Are Still Dying,” which won the 2007 Afghan Civil Society’s literature contest, “Dolphin’s Alley,” which won the Ahmad Shamlou Poetry Award in 2021, “The Fish Have Fled Our Veins,” and “Audience.” Mehrdad has also published an essay collection, “The Rain Passed,” a novel, “The Living” (Zendagan), and wrote soap opera, “Silent Paradise,” for the Afghan network Tolo TV, which won the 2011 Rumi Award for best Soap Opera writing. He taught Persian literature at Al-Beroni University, Afghanistan (2011-2021) and at the Misbah and Tabesh Institute of Higher Education (2008-2009). Mehrdad has translated the work Allen Ginsburg, Sylvia Plath, Vladimir Mayakovsky, and Langston Hughes into Dari. From 2020- 2022, he served as Editor in Chief of Hasht-e Subh, a major national newspaper in Afghanistan. After facing threats from the Taliban and fleeing from Afghanistan after August 2021, Mujib is currently in the United States with his wife and young child.