Swimming in the Storm

Christopher (Kit) Kelen is a poet and painter, resident in the Myall Lakes of NSW. Published widely since the seventies, he has a dozen full length collections in English as well as translated books of poetry in Chinese, Portuguese, French, Italian, Spanish, Indonesian, Swedish, Norwegian, Filipino, Greek, with an Esperanto volume to follow. Swimming in the Storm is Kit Kelen's first volume of poems presenting a Romanian translation alongside the original English. Kit's father, Kelen Istvan (Stephen), journalist and novelist, and table-tennis world champion with the Hungarian team from 1929-1935, first arrived in Australia in 1937, and later sought asylum there, serving in the Australian army, in New Guinea, Borneo and, after the war, in Japan. Stephen Kelen was the only foreign journalist to attend the first Peace Festival in Hiroshima, on August 6th, 1946, later publishing a memoir of the experience, titled I Remember Hiroshima. One of Kit's grandmothers was born in Carei, Transylvania (today's Romania).In 2022 Kit Kelen's published the volume Book of Mother (Puncher & Wattmann), and a bilingual (Greek and English) volume a postcard from the fires, a picture of the rains (Kaleidoscope, Athens). Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Macau, where he taught for many years, Kit Kelen is also a Professor at the University of Newcastle. In 2017, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Malmo, in Sweden. Among Kelen's scholarly publications there are several monographs about poetry and children's literature, as well as two on national anthems - Anthem Quality - National Songs: A Theoretical Survey, and (with Aleksandr Pavkovic) Anthems and the Making of Nation States - Identity and Nationalism in the Balkans. His most recent scholarly book, Poetics and Ethics of Anthropomorphism - Children, Animals and Poetry with You Chengcheng (Routledge, 2022).Kit has been involved in poetry translation with several languages and directions and has had a long interest in the poetry of Central and Eastern Europe. In 2009 he published (in English) a volume of responses to Romanian poets (including Sorescu, Caraion, Cassian) titled, after Dinescu, God preserve me from those who want what's best for me. Series Editor for Flying Islands Books, Kit has mentored many poets and translators from various parts of the world and run several on-line communities of practice in poetry (notably Project 366 from 2016-2020). Kit is a Fellow of the Royal Society of NSW. You can follow Kit's work-in-progress at the Daily Kit - https://thedailykitkelen.blogspot.com/