Anton Baev was born in the city of
Plovdiv.
In 1982 he graduated from the
English Language Secondary School in Plovdiv.
In 1989 he got a Master’s Degree (MA
in Bulgarian philology) at the University of Plovdiv.
Anton Baev specialized in community
journalism in Iowa State University (USA) in 1994.
In 2009 he obtained a Doctor’s
degree at the Institute for Literature at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.
Anton Baev has worked as a
librarian, columnist, reporter, foreign politics observer, editor-in-chief and publisher.
In 2000-2007 he was an Editor-in-Chief of Maritsa newspaper – the biggest regional
daily in Bulgaria, issued in Plovdiv.
Since July 2007 A. Baev has
established a number of online newspapers: www.plovdiv-online.com, www.karlovo-online.com, www.asenovgrad-online.com, where he
has been developing his career as a publisher, editor and columnist.
In 2016 he was among the
establishers of Plovdiv LIK Foundation (a foundation for literature,
art and culture), which is focused on presenting the works of the most
prominent contemporary Bulgarian authors in different languages. A leading goal
of the site of the Foundation (PlovdivLit)
is to present contemporary Balkan and European authors – especially with a view
to the fact that Plovdiv (the second largest city in Bulgaria) was chosen to be
the European Capital of Culture for 2019.
Anton Baev is also a member of the
Board the Municipal Foundation Plovdiv
2019 and President of the Writer’s
Society in Plovdiv since the beginning of 2017.
In 2018 Anton Baev established The International Poetry Festival ‘ORPHEUS’
– PLOVDIV, which had two editions by now. 30 participants – poets from USA,
Russia, France, Italy, Spain, Ukraine, Israel, Turkey, Denmark, North
Macedonia, Greece, Romania, Serbia, Bulgaria gathered together in Plovdiv, the oldest living
city of Europe. ‘ORPHEUS’ - PLOVDIV is
a project of Plovdiv LIK Foundation.
It includes creative, cultural, educational and promotional activities united
by the desire for exchanging ideas, inspiration and creative contacts.
Literary Career
Poetry
Anton Baev’s first poetry collection
– Snow Signals (1988), was awarded
with the National prize for literary debut South
Spring.
It was followed by The Backside of the Darkness (1991); The Rider, the Night and the Desert
(1995), the last one – awarded with the National prize Ivan Nikolov; The Crucifixion
of Odigitriya (1998).
His next poetry collection, The Whole World and Other Apocrypha
(2002), was defined by the critics as the first complete attempt for searching the
cultural and topographical center of Bulgarian poetry within the Mediterranean culture.
In 2004, Anton Baev published his next
poetry collection, The Gifts of the
World. New Apocrypha, in which he developed his experimental approach in
dramatizing mythology and history, and thus created an innovative modern
poetical expression based on them. It was fully translated in Macedonian by
Borche Georgiev and was published in 2018 by Ziga Zaga books: Scopie.
In 2011, a book of selected poetry Dunya Nimetleri (The Gifts of the World) by
Anton Baev was published in Turkish, Istanbul:
Yasakmeyve.
In 2012, his poetry book was
published – Diaries of the Castaway –
awarded with the literary prize Plovdiv.
In 2018, his latest poetry book was
published – 55 Melancholia of Anton Baev – awarded with the literary prize
Plovdiv. It was fully translated in English by Vera Ivanova and edited by
George.
Prose
In Anton Baev’s literary career, there
is also quite a large share of prose.
He is the author of the novel Americans (1997), which had two editions;
and the book of philosophical fragments Noah’s
Ark (1999).
In 2005 he published a book of short
stories, Women and Planets,
translated in Turkish.
It was followed by another book of
short stories, Victor Bulgari (2010), which is focused on the life of
the emigrants from the Balkans to Germany.
In 2006 Anton Baev’s second novel, Scars from Bulgarian, was published and awarded with Plovdiv prize for Literature. The novel
has two editions.
In 2014 Anton Baev’s third novel
appeared – Do Not Expect Another Heaven.
His fourth novel, The Holly Blood (2016), won the Razvitie Fund Special Prize for a new Bulgarian novel, competing
with 118 participants. In 2018 it was published in North Macedonia, Scopie: Antolog.
His fifth novel, The True Story of Spas Gospodov, was
published in 2017.
In 2017 was published the novel Victor Bulgari. Traeumen in Berlin, in
German language: Anthea Verlag, Berlin.
Anton Baev’s latest novel – Maria from Ohrid and the Holly Conception,
which was written in North Macedonia – will be published at the end of 2020.
Drama
Anton Baev is also the author of drama
texts – the tragicomedy Spas Gospodov in
the Whirlpools of the Flood (2014) and Spas
Gospodov and the Golden Marigold (2018).
Academic Career
Since 2009, when he
defended his doctoral thesis at the Institute for Literature – the Bulgarian
Academy of Sciences, Anton Baev has written and published two academic
monographs.
The first of them – Ivan Peichev [Romantic Formation. Romantic Motives]. Monograph. Plovdiv, 2010 – resembles the results of his
doctoral study on the movement of Romanticism and its Bulgarian appearances.
The second one – The Suicidal Syndrome and the Characters of
Pavel Vezhinov. Monograph. Plovdiv, 2015
– is focused on the psychoanalytical approach in literature, applied to the
characters of the prominent Bulgarian belletrist Pavel Vezhinov.
Anton Baev’s works are translated in
English, German, Italian, Spanish, French, Turkish, Greek, Romanian, Macedonian,
Albanian, Serbian and Russian languages.
