I don't find English restrictive, but it brings a level of discipline to my writing that I wouldn't have in Bulgarian. My control of English, however…

- Miroslav Penkov

Words physically have power to bring things into existence.

- Miroslav Penkov

One of the things people often say about America is that it's a such a young country, relatively, and its problem - Europeans say this - is that they…

- Miroslav Penkov

When I was writing in Bulgarian, I could hide behind beautiful prose.

- Miroslav Penkov

I was really interested in the ritual of fire dancing. I saw it when I was a kid. My parents took me to the Black Sea, it was like a tourist attracti…

- Miroslav Penkov

I think that's the nature of the region, not even simply Eastern Europe but the Balkans. They are their own region. They are a peculiar place. They d…

- Miroslav Penkov

In certain places, not always, there are moments where I tried to convey in English a sense of foreignness. I wanted the reader to get the sense that…

- Miroslav Penkov

Helpful to me over the years was some of Ernest Hemingway's writing, for example A Farewell to Arms. You have characters who speak Italian or Spanish…

- Miroslav Penkov

I have done literary translation because the University of Arkansas, where I did my MFA, was program of creative writing and translation, and it's a …

- Miroslav Penkov