Panel: Translation and Creative Practice, chaired by Erica Hesketh

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Poet and former director of the Poetry Translation Centre Erica Hesketh will lead an engaging conversation about the practice of translation and how it impacts English-language writing. She will be joined by Livia Franchini, Kotryna Garanasvili, and Nasim Luczaj.

Erica Hesketh is a poet and editor, originally from Japan and Denmark. Her poetry has been commissioned by the Royal Festival Hall, Spread the Word, the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Exeter University. She is the author of In the Lily Room (Nine Arches Press) and To an Unknown Receiver: Sonnets & Cascades (Guillemot Press), and co-author with Laura Sampson of Moon, Snow, Blossom: Wintry Folk Tales from Across Japan (Elliott & Thompson). From 2016 to 2024 she was director of the Poetry Translation Centre; she is currently artistic director of Winchester Poetry Festival.

Livia Franchini is a writer and translator from Tuscany, Italy. She is the author of two novels, Shelf Life and High Tide, and the co-editor of Too Little, Too Hard, a collection of essays on writing, work and value. Her most recent English-language translation is Lorenza Mazzetti's The Sky is Falling. Livia is Lecturer in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, where she also coordinates the Goldsmiths Prize. She lives in south east London with her family. 

Kotryna Garanasvili is a writer, translator and interpreter working with English, Lithuanian, French, German, Russian, and Georgian. She is an Assistant Professor of literature and translation, teaching at Vilnius University and University of East Anglia, where she has received a PhD in literary translation and serves as a member of the BCLT Research Group. She is a mentor as well as a previous mentee of the Emerging Translator Mentorship at the National Centre for Writing and has been awarded traineeships at the EU Council and the European Parliament. You can find her on Instagram at @kotrynagaranasvili

Nasim Luczaj is a prize-winning poet, Polish–English translator and editor. She is the author of Hind Mouth (Earthbound Press) and Ultraviolet with Landing Marks (Oblique House). Her debut collection, Tang, is forthcoming from Faber & Faber in 2027. Raised in Subcarpathia, she divides her time between London and Glasgow.

Location details

Manor House Library, 34 Old Road, Lee, London SE13 5SY (London Borough of Lewisham).

Ten minutes' walk from Hither Green Station, fourteen minutes from Blackheath Station. The DLR runs to Lewisham, approximately 20 minutes' walk away, and is serviced well by taxis and numerous bus routes to within less than 400 yards of the venue.

Manor House Library is an eighteenth-century Grade II* listed building set in the award-winning Manor House Gardens park. We have level entrance access throughout, with ample toilet facilities. We will be operating a pay bar throughout the day serving a selection of wines, beers and soft drinks. The event spaces where talks are held and the bar operates are air conditioned, and the ornate ceilings in the library itself sit alongside works of twenty-first century art from the Calico Collection and paintings of the Baring family, who once occupied the house and were known as "the sixth great European power," facilitating the Louisiana Purchase. A library for over a hundred years, Manor House now attracts over 250,000 visits a year.

There is a car park to the front of the library, but spaces are limited. Parking on the roads around Manor House and the park is free of charge on Sundays.

Calico Projects operates four libraries in Lewisham and numerous other arts and community venues. It is a registered charity (number 1180229).