Leo Butnaru


Leo Butnaru is a writer from Moldova and Romania. He holds a degree in journalism and philology from the University of Moldova. He has worked in publishing, as editor and editor-in-chief, at magazines such as, Moldovan Youth, Literature and Art, and Moldova. His first poetry publication was a chapbook, Wing in Light. In 1977, he became a member of the Writers Union of the Soviet Union. In the same year, he is removed from the staff of Moldova Youth. He is a member of the Romanian Writers Union. He is a founding member of the Moldovan PEN Center. From 1997 to 2005, he was president of the Chisinau branch of the Romanian Writers Union. He is on the board of the Romanian Writers Union.
In 2019 some media sources announced that Leo Butnaru has been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Poetry

  • Saturday toward Sunday
  • Polite Forms
  • Working Sundays
  • Golden Falcon
  • Access Bridge
  • Necessary Illusion
  • Nonparallel Lives
  • Typewriter Quarantine
  • Necessary Illusion
  • Gladiator of Destinies
  • Address Identifier
  • Semiramida's Lament
  • Absolute Essential
  • Alongside the Noose, Flag, and Angel
  • The Fortress Is Not Ready for War
  • Itinerant Sphynx
  • Other, the Same
  • In Case of Danger
  • and The Opposite Direction
  • Daily Order, Nightly Order
  • Robbing Picasso
  • In a Traffic Jam & Nabokov Partitions
  • With the Knees on Dices
  • Instruments of a Sentinel of the Self
  • The Protester and the Pipe Organ
  • Surfing in Galilee

Fiction

  • Why Exactly Tomorrow-The Day After?
  • The Angel and the Seamstress
  • Ulysses' Last Journey
  • Child with the Russians
  • Romanian Roulette
  • Angels and laughing-crying

Diaries

Translations

The Russian Avant-Garde, Horizon Testimonial, The Panorama of the Russian Avantgarde Poetry, The Panorama of the Ukrainian Avantgarde Poetry, volumes by V. Khlebnikov, V. Mayakovski, N. Gumilev, O. Mandelstam, A. Akhmatova, M. Tzvetaeva, L. Dobâcin, D. Kharms, I. Bahterev, Gh. Ayghi, I. Satunovski; and modern poets V. Pavlova, Е. Stepanov, А. Veprev.
His poetry and prose have appeared in Albanian, Armenian, English, Bulgarian, French, Georgian, German, Letton, Macedonian, Russian, Serbian, Slovakian, Spanish, Swedish, Ukrainian, and Hungarian.
His books have been published in France, Russia, Germany, Italia, Poland, Serbia, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Tatarstan, and Ukraine.
Takes part in international projects.

Prizes

State distinctions of Moldova and Romanian.