Dzyanis Aygi

Career

His poetry is written both in Chuvash and in Russian. He was born in the village of Shaimurzino (Çĕnyal), Chuvashia (Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics) and started writing poetry in the Chuvash language in 1958. Sofia Gubaidulina set several of his poems to music in her cycle Jetzt immer Schnee ("Now always snow").

Achievements

• Among the recognitions he has won are the Andrey Bely Prize (1987), the Pasternak Prize (2000, the first to be awarded this), the Prize of the French Academy (1972), the Petrarch Prize (1993), the Golden Wreath of the Struga Poetry Evenings in 1994 and the January Smrek Prize (Bratislava, Slovakia).