Larissa Shmailo
253 West 72nd Street #715
New York, NY 10023
212-712-9865
Larissa@LarissaShmailo.com
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larissa_Shmailo
http://larissashmailo.blogspot.com
www.LarissaShmailo.com
Download Larissa's biography, résumé, or full electronic press kit as a .pdf.
Literary Résumé
LARISSA SHMAILO, INC.
Owner (2014–present)
Poet, translator, novelist, editor, writing coach, educator, critic. Workshop facilitator, Writing Resilience, for people affected by trauma, addiction, and/or mental illness.
PUBLISHING EXPERIENCE
Chief Scribe, Scribes (2007–2013)
Translator and Writer, American Bible Society (2008–2012)
Senior Editor, McGraw Hill (2005–2006)
Senior Editor, Kaplan, Inc. (1999–2005)
BOOKS
Self-help
- Writing Resilience Workbook (Patient Women Press, NY 2021)
Novels
- Sly Bang (Spuyten Duyvil, Brooklyn, NY 2018)
- Patient Women (BlazeVOX [books], Kenmore, NY 2015). Semifinalist, Subito Press/University of Boulder Prose Competition.
Poetry
- Dora/Lora (Unlikely Books, New Orleans, LA, 2023)
- Medusa’s Country, (MadHat Press, Asheville, NC, 2016)
- #specialcharacters (Unlikely Books, New Orleans, 2014). Finalist, Elizabeth P. Braddock Award.
- In Paran (BlazeVOX [books], Kenmore, NY, 2009)
- Fib Sequence (chapbook) (Argotist Ebooks, 2011)
- A Cure for Suicide (chapbook) (Červená Barva Press, West Somerville, MA, 2006)
MAJOR TRANSLATIONS
- From Pushkin to Pussy Riot: 30 Contemporary Voices on Russia and Politics (anthology co-edited with Philip Nikolayev) Matter, September 2019.
- “Translation of the Bible in Russia,” Michael Seleznev in Noss, Philip A., and Charles S. Houser, eds. A Guide to Bible Translation: People, Languages, and Topics. Maitland, FL: Xulon Press and Swindon, Eng.: United Bible Societies, 2019
- Victory over the Sun by Alexei Kruchenych (Červená Barva Press, West Somerville, MA, 2014)
- Twenty-first Century Russian Poetry (online anthology; editor-in-chief; Big Bridge Press, 2013)
- Bibliography of Bible Translations in the Languages of the Russian Federation, Other Countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States, and the Baltic States. Eugene A. Nida Institute for Biblical Scholarship of the American Bible Society (through 2010—publication pending update)
POETRY RECORDINGS (Digital Distribution and CDs)
- Exorcism (2008)
- The No-Net World (2006)
RECENT CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS
- “Victory over the Sun through the Lens of Gender” for Translating the Untranslatable: A Reading of International Experimental Poetry. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Virtual Conference, March 2021.
- “The Hybrid Female ‘No’: Sexual Sadism in David Foster Wallace’s ‘Brief Interviews with Hideous Men’” for Hybrid Sex Writing: What’s Your Position? (with Erica Jong). Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Portland, OR. March 2019.
- “Poetic Hermeneutics and Editorial Practice – A Foray” for The Critical Creative: The Editor-Poet (with Kwame Dawes). Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Portland, OR, March 2019.
- “Distributing the Semes: Prosody in the Experimental Poetry of Alexandr Skidan.” Association of Slavic, Eastern European and Eurasian Studies 50th Anniversary Conference, Boston, December 2018.
- Politics, Prosody, and Hybrid Forms: Subversions by Rankine and Smith” for The Semi-formal: Hybrid Free and Formal Verse. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Tampa, March 2018.
- “Endangered Music: Formal Poetry in the 21st Century.” Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Los Angeles, April, 2016
- “‘Everything Has Become Masculine’: Hypermasculinity and War in Victory over the Sun” for Translation from Pushkin to Pussy Riot. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Minneapolis, April, 2015.
CREATIVE NONFICTION
- poetic diversity: the litzine of Los Angeles: “Alcoholics Anonymous and the ‘Recovered’ Movement: When the 12 Steps Turn Toxic” (nominated for Sundress Best of the Net 2019 anthology)
- poetic diversity: the litzine of Los Angeles: “No Kids” – personal essay to be published November 2019.
- Sensitive Skin: “I Blame Louise Hay for Trump”- essay; winter 2018
- Unlikely Stories: “Blow by Blow: The Story of My Beating as a Psychiatric Patient at Mount Sinai Hospital,” July 2017
- Sensitive Skin: “Dr. B. Said” – exposé, personal essay, 2016
- Sensitive Skin: “Russian Graves” – personal essay, 2014
SELECTED PUBLICATION IN JOURNALS (poetry unless otherwise specified)
- “Victory over the Sun,” Academia Letters, Doi:10.20935/AL3959, October 2021
- “‘Everything Has Become Masculine’: Hypermasculinity and War in Victory over the Sun,” Academia Letters, Doi: 10.20935/AL702, April 2021
- Three poems by Maria Galina translated from the Russian, The Café Review Russia Issue, Summer 2019
- KGB Lit: Translations from the Russian of Alexander Pushkin's "I loved you once . . . "; Arseny Tarkovsky's "June 25, 1939," Alexander Blok's "Night, avenue . .. "; and Vladimir Mayakovsky's "It's after one . . .” and original poem “Anna Karenina #MeToo,” June 2019
- Matter: “Terms of Allegiance,” March 2019
- St. Petersburg Review “’New Life 7 – Mistranslation with Addenda”; “Kompromat,” Winter 2018
- New Verse News: “Class War,” December 2018
- Unlikely Stories Mark V: Excerpt from my novel, Sly Bang, July 2018
- Journal of Poetics Research: “Gaia’s Lunacy”; ‘This is the rupture of heart . . .’; “Frog Prayer”; “Spectrum Sells Out”; “Catrain”; ‘An old red tree . . .’; “Cis Boom Trans,” April 2018
- Eoagh: “Clad, Clawed, Clandestine Eagly Pig”; “Anna Karenina”; “Razor,” August 2017
- Unlikely Stories Mark V”: “Bhakti”; “The Trick Wants to Go to Plato’s,” September 2016
- Plume: “Your Probability Amplitude”; “Fragment from The Ilatease of Homey, from a Recently Discovered Mycenaean Text,” January 2016
- Connotation Press: Excerpt from my novel, Patient Women, September 2015
- St. Petersburg Review: “My Vronsky”; “The Searchers,”’ Summer 2015
- JMWW: “Rapes,” August 2015
- Atlanta Review: Translation of Alexander Skidan’s “The Temptation of St. Marcuse” (with Alexander Cigale); June 2015
- Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion: “Apple Bhagan of Mahedevi-Akka,” Spring 2015
- Sensitive Skin: “Erasure, The Lotus Eaters, Ulysses,” April 2015
- Enchanting Verses Literary Review: “In Paran”; “Love’s Comely Behind,” December 2014
- Cryopoetry: “Live, Not Die; Live Not, Die (Sestina),” March 2015
- New Mirage Journal: “Copy Cat”; “Memento Mama”; “Sunken Virgin”; “Daddy’s Elusive Love,” December 2014
- Levure littéraire: “War”; “To the Thanatos within Me”; “Thanatos in Love,” November 2014
- Truck: “Chimera:”; translation of Arseny Tarkovsky’s “June 25, 1939,” November 2014
- Thrice Fiction: “The Mudd Club” (excerpt from my novel, Patient Women); August 2014
- The Common: “Schweinerei”; “Phylum,” August 2013
- Gargoyle: “The Girl from the Paris Review Says ‘Uncool.’” May 2012
- Barrow Street 10th Anniversary Issue: “How to Meet and Dance with Your Death (Como encuentrar y bailar con su muerte): A Cure for Suicide”; “New Life 2,” Winter 2008
- FULCRUM: “In Paran”; “Personal,” July 2008
- Rattapallax (journal and CD): “Madwoman,” September 1999
- Lungfull: “Hunts Point Counterpoint,” Autumn 1997
- Big City Lit, the rivers of it, abridged: “Aerial View of the Rockies”; “New Life: Variations on a Theme by Joseph Brodsky et. al.”; “How to Meet and Dance with Your Death (Como encuentrar y bailar con su muerte): A Cure for Suicide”; “Abortion Hallucination”; “Skin,” Fall 2007
- Drunken Boat “Magpie Translations of Joseph Brodsky’s New Life” (four mistranslations), October 2007
- Icorn, International Cities of Refuge Networks: “How My Family Survived the Camps” and “Hunts Point Counterpoint,” Summer 2007
- MiPoesias Online: “How to Meet and Dance with Your Death (Como encuentrar y bailar con su muerte): A Cure for Suicide,” 2007
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS IN ANTHOLOGIES
- Choice Word: Poems about Abortion (Haymarket). “Abortion Hallucination. ”Publication pending.
- Breugel and Bosch. “Fall of Icarus.” (Publication pending).
- Assiduous Dusr, multiple poems. (Publication pending.”
- Resist Much / Obey Little: Poems for the Inaugural (Spuyten Duyvil Press): "Whorl's Eyelet Captured"; "Lager NYC," Winter 2017
- Verde que te quiero verde: Poems after Garcia Lorca (Peeterse): “To the Thanatos within Me,” April 2017
- Measure for Measure: An Anthology of Poetic Meters (Everyman’s Library/Penguin Random House): “In Paran” as example of dipodic meter. February 2015
- Ginosko 2: “Shore”; “Mapping,” February 2014
- Red Wheelbarrow: Erasure poems, Ulysses. 2014
- Women Write Resistance: Poets Resist Gender Violence (Wiseman) “Howl 2,” February 2013
- Words for the Wedding (Perigee Books /Penguin Putnam): “Vow”; “Personal,” December 2011
- Pirene’s Fountain (Anthology for Japan tsunami relief): “Winedark Sea,” December 2011
- The Unbearables Big Book of Sex (Autonomedia): “The Other Woman’s Cunt,” September 2011
- Contemporary Russian Poetry (Dalkey Archive Press): Translations of Yuri Arabov and Anya Logvinova. January 2008
- About: Poetry (About.com Spring Poems Anthology): “Spring Vow,” Spring 2007
- Poetry in Performance 35 – City University of New York: “Vow,” 2007
- Half-Naked Muse (Hungarian bilingual anthology): “How My Family Survived the Camps”; “My First Hurricane”; “Jamas Volveré,” 2000
- Slavfile Pushkin 200th Anniversary: Translation of “I loved you once . . .” by Alexander Pushkin. Winter 2000
SELECTED CRITICAL WRITING
- American Book Review: Uncommon Riddlers: A Review of Uncommon Creatures: The Anglo-Saxon Riddle-Poems translated and illuminated by Bertha Rogers, April 2021
- North of Oxford: “A Desire for Wholeness: A Review of Erica Jong’s The World Began with Yes,” July 2019
- North of Oxford: “A Review of Michael T. Young’s The Infinite Doctrine of Water,” August 2018
- North of Oxford: “A Review of Marc Vincenz’s Leaning into the Infinite,” July 2018
- North of Oxford: “The Romantic Surrealist’s Ear —A Review of Blue Lyre by Jeffrey Cyphers Wright,” March 2019
- North of Oxford: “Boundary Problems: A Review of Thaddeus Rutkowski’s Border Crossings,” June 2018
- Journal of Poetics Research: “On the Nature of Reality, On the Reality of Nature: A Review of Dean Kostos’s Pierced by Night-colored Threads” November, 2017
- Jacket2: “The Author and Authority: Daniil Kharms and the Russian Absurd translated by Alexander Cigale,” May 2017
- Grafias: “I Sonettti Integrati di Philip Nikolayev: La Combinatoria del Contesto.” Translated by Valentina Zagrefnini. December 2017
- “Metrical Action in the Free Verse of Bob Holman,” October 2016
- “Vagabond Imagination: Review of Leonard Schwartz’s If”; June 2015
- Brooklyn Rail: “A Spider’s Mirror”: Elaine Equi’s Click and Clone,” November 2013
- Drunken Boat: “Experimental Poetry in the 21st Century—A Foray,” 2013
- Jacket: “On the Constancy of Dirt and Joy: Review of Today I Wrote Nothing: The Selected Writings of Daniil Kharms translated by Matvei Yankelevich,” late 2008
- Jacket: “On Rambling: A Review of Philip Nikolayev’s Letters from Aldenderry,” October 2007
- Big City Lit, the rivers of it, abridged: “When Pop Gets Culture: Elaine Equi’s Ripple Effect: New and Selected Poems,” Fall 2007;
- Big City Lit, the rivers of it, abridged:“Poetry in the Shadow of the Towers: C.K. Williams and Galway Kinnell at the 92nd Street Y,” April 2002
SELECTED AWARDS AND PRESS
- Listed in Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larissa_Shmailo
- Nominated for Sundress Best of the Net 2019 anthology for creative fiction essay “Alcoholics Anonymous and the ‘Recovered’ Movement: When the 12 Steps Turn Toxic.”
- Victory over the Sun translated by Shmailo performed internationally and reviewed in New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/1983/11/20/arts/russia-s-cubo-futurists-created-a-startling-opera.html and http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/27/arts/theater-victory-over-the-sun.html) and Russia Beyond the Headlines (http://rbth.com/literature/2015/01/21/the_enduring_appeal_of_russias_avant-garde_43039.html)
- Twenty-first Century Russian Poetry featured on Poetry Foundation Harriet blog, Russia Beyond the Headlines, and Voice of Russia (http://rbth.com/literature/2013/07/23/fifty_russian_poets_unveiled_in_online_anthology_28317.html)
- Honorable Mention, Compass Award in Russian Translation, sponsored by Princeton, Georgetown, and Montclair State Universities, 2011
- Honorable Mention, Elizabeth P. Braddock Poetry Prize for #specialcharacters, 2012
- Honorable Mention, Goodreads May 2012 Poetry Contest
- Finalist, Glass Woman Prose Prize, 2012
- Semifinalist, Subito Press/University of Boulder Prose Competition for Patient Women, 2014.
- New Century Music awards for best spoken word with rock, jazz, and electronica as well as best album award for Exorcism, 2009
- Critic’s Pick, Time Out Magazine, for reading series Sliding Scale Poetry, 1996
- Radio Highlight, New York Times, for New York Board of Education Madwoman radio poetry series, 1996
SELECTED READINGS AND PRESENTATIONS
- The Pop Discourses, Special Episode One: Larissa Shmailo Poet, Novelist, and Translator. Podcast host Jeff Thomason. April 2021
- From Russia with Love: A SLY BANG Book Party. Sponsored by the Russian American Cultural Association, Yorkville Library, New York, May 2019
- Moderator, Hybrid Sex Writing: What’s Your Position? (with Erica Jong). Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Portland, OR. March 2019.
- Panelist and Panel Organizer, The Critical Creative: The Editor-Poet (with Kwame Dawes). Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Portland, OR, May, 2019.
- Panelist, “Distributing the Semes: Prosody in the Experimental Poetry of Alexandr Skidan.” Association of Slavic, Eastern European and Eurasian Studies 50th Anniversary Conference, Boston, December 2018.
- Panelist, The Semi-formal: Hybrid Free and Formal Verse. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Tampa, March 2018.
- Moderator, Endangered Music: Formal Poetry in the 21st Century. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Los Angeles, April, 2016
- Panelist, The Semi-formal: Hybrid Free and Formal Verse. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Tampa, March 2018.
- Moderator, Endangered Music: Formal Poetry in the 21st Century. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Los Angeles, April, 2016.
- Performer and panelist, Victory over the Sun restaging at Boston University, April, 2015.
- Moderator, Daughters of Baba Yaga: The Eastern European Woman Poet in the United States. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Minneapolis, April, 2015.
- Panelist, Translation from Pushkin to Pussy Riot. Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, Minneapolis, April, 2015.
- Guest, Cross-Cultural Communications, PennSound Radio, April, 2015
- Poetry reading, Art and Psyche conference, New York University, July 2012
- Performance poetry with SoundCrew band, The Knitting Factory, 2009
- Frequent appearances on New York City Board of Education radio WNYE and public radio WBAI
SELECTED INTERVIEWS
- Argotist Online interview by Dean Kostos, 2019
- Červená Barva Press interview by Gloria Mindock, 2006
SELECTED TRANSLATIONS OF SHMAILO’S WORK
Iranian poet Mohammad Mostaghimi has translated a number of Shmailo’s poems into Persian. Most of them are published on his weblog 'dishe sepid'. Shmailo’s work also appears in Hungarian translation in Half Naked Muse translated and edited by Gabor Gyukics.
SELECTED REVIEWS OF SHMAILO’S WORK
Reviews of Shmailo's work by Chris Campanioni, Michael T. Young, Dean Kostos, Meredith Sue Willis, Jeff Hansen, and others have appeared in the Brooklyn Rail; Books for Readers; The Lit Pub; Unlikely Stories; Altered Scale and other publications.
LITERARY EDITORSHIPS
Contributing Editor, Dispatches from the Poetry Wars, 2018–present
Editor, MadHat Annual, 2014–2015
Contributing Editor, Big City Lit, 2008–2014
LITERARY CURATION
Founder and curator, The Feminist Poets in Low-Cut Blouses, 1996–present
Director and curator, TWiN Poetry Collective (online collective of 8,000 audio poets), 2006–2009
TEACHING
- Guest lecturer, Queens College/CUNY, May 2016
- Guest lecturer, Lesley University, March 2014
- Student teaching at P.S. 50, Manhattan. Master's program: Hunter College Teach U., 6/09-8/09
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS
- Member, PEN
- Member, the Academy of American Poets
EDUCATION
- Barnard College, BA in Russian. Phi Beta Kappa, Magna Cum Laude, Honors in Major, 1985
- New York City Teaching Fellow, 2009
- Columbia University, graduate work in the linguistics of translation, 1985
- Mentored by Annie Finch (metric poetry), 2015