NEW YORK, NY—Poet Susan Barba, the recent winner of the Anahid Literary Award, will be honored at the Anahid Literary Awards celebration on Thursday, March 5 at Columbia University. The award is given by the Armenian Center.
Barba was the 2018 recipient of the award for her book of poems Fair Sun. The prize is given to the best literary work in English by a writer of Armenian descent, and is made possible by a generous gift from an anonymous donor.
Susan Barba was born in Morristown, N.J. and educated at Dartmouth College. She earned an MFA from Boston University, and a PhD in comparative literature from Harvard University. Her first book of poems Fair Sun was published in 2017 by David R. Godine Publishers. She is also a co-editor of I Want to Live: Poems of Shushanik Kurghinian (2005). Her poems have appeared in Poetry, The Hudson Review, The Yale Review, Antioch Review, Raritan and other journals. Her translations from Armenian have appeared in Words Without Borders and Ararat. Barba is a senior editor for The New York Review of Books.
“The Anahid Award has been an occasion for the Armenian community to be self-aware, to take note of the works of literature that are being written now, to celebrate those works, and to affirm the horizons they open up for each writer and for the broader Armenian community and culture,” said Peter Balakian, chair of the committee and the evening’s master of ceremonies.
The Anahid Award was founded in 1988 to honor emerging Armenian-American writers. The prize is given by the Armenian Center at Columbia University and comes with an award of $5,000. Since its founding, there have been more than a dozen winners in poetry, fiction, playwriting and screenwriting, including Leslie Ayvazian, Peter Balakian, Eric Bogosian, Chris Bohjalian, Atom Egoyan, Diana Der Hovanessian, Aris Janigian, Nancy Kricorian, Micheline Aharonian Marcom, Arthur Nersesian and Patricia Sarrafian Ward.
The celebration will be held at 6:30 p.m. at Faculty House, Presidential Rooms 2 and 3, located at 64 Morningside Drive on Columbia University’s campus. A reception will follow the program. This event is free and open to the public. RSVPs should be directed to Dr. Khatchig Mouradian, lecturer in Armenian Studies, at km3253@columbia.edu.
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