Past event
Translating Mothersland: Shahzoda Samarqandi, Shelley Fairweather-Vega, and the Politics of Language - Pay as you can
Shahzoda Samarqandi's novel Mothersland is rooted in the cotton fields of Uzbekistan. Written in Tajik, translated into Russian, and from there into English by Shelley Fairweather-Vega, the novel traces the ecological and human cost of Soviet colonialism through the eyes of Mahtab, a young woman navigating identity, displacement, and resistance. At its heart is the draining of the Aral Sea to supply cotton to the Soviet Empire—an environmental catastrophe whose consequences still reverberate today.
Now living in exile in the Netherlands, Samarqandi is a Tajik author, poet, and journalist born in Uzbekistan. Her politically charged novels, which centre women's experiences, cannot be published in her country of birth. She has worked across radio and television and was named one of BBC Persian's most influential women. Her translator, Shelley Fairweather-Vega, is based in the United States and works from Russian and Uzbek. A passionate advocate for Central Asian literature, she has translated widely from the region, championing voices often excluded from the global literary conversation. Samarqandi and Fairweather-Vega will read from Mothersland in Tajik and English. In conversation with Sarah Gear, they will explore ecocide, feminism, Soviet colonialism, and translation as a political act.