Kjell Espmark (b.1930) was Professor of Comparative Literature at Stockholm University from 1978 to 1995 and has been a member of The Swedish Academy since 1981, serving as Chairman of The Nobel Committee from 1988 to 2004. He has published twenty volumes of poetry, ten novels, and over a dozen volumes of literary criticism. His many awards include The Bellman Prize, The Tranströmer Prize, Il Premio Capri and Il Premio Internazionale Camaiore. He is an officer of L'ordre de Mérite. He has been translated into over twenty languages. Of the Spanish version of his latest book of poetry, Martin Lopez-Vega wrote in El Mundo: "The Creation confirms that we are faced with one of the most important poets of our time." Many of Espmark's poems are dramatic monologues in which the dead, some famous, some anonymous, speak to us, hoping for our attention. Another consistent feature of his poetry, and one which we can see extending over six decades, is the coherence we find within each volume, echoes and cross-references linking poems not only within a single collection but from book to book.

Poetry. Translated from the Swedish by Robin Fulton. Robin Fulton generously delivers precise translations of the renowned Swedish poet Kjell Espmark. Espmark may speak eloquently of a man without voice, withoutthe sufficient language to act, as he writes in his poem "Silence": It's getting dark. The spruce trees blackenlike the pages of my calendar. But turn the pagesand let the blackness light your way.Yes, I usually speak in a borrowed voice, the voice of the woman who reads in metranslating my Swedish into Swedish.Like pressing oneself through a keyholeand almost getting shoulders and hips through it.But this poet's words ring in our ears in a language beyond words, beyond continents or social strata; his voice is that of a man who has something to say that we all must hear.

Poetry. Translated from the Swedish by Robin Fulton. LEND ME YOUR VOICE (original Swedish title: Vintergata) is "the best collection of poetry published so far by a Swedish poet in the 21st century" according to the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet. The book has already appeared in Spanish, German, Italian, Romanian, Croatian, and Chinese. This is its first translation into English.