Mark Tardi

Poet and translator Mark Tardi (he/him) grew up in Chicago, Illinois, and earned an MFA in creative writing from Brown University. His collections of poetry include The Circus of Trust (Dalkey Archive Press, 2017), Airport Music (Burning Deck, 2013), and Euclid Shudders (Litmus Press, 2003).

Tardi’s Polish heritage led him to an early interest in Polish poetry, and he was a 2008–2009 Fulbright Senior Lecturer in American literature and culture at the University of Łódź, Poland. His translation publications include Unsovereign by Kacper Bartczak (above/ground press, 2024), Viscera: Eight Voices from Poland (Litmus Press, 2024), The Squatter’s Gift by Robert Rybicki (Dalkey Archive Press, 2021), Faith in Strangers by Katarzyna Szaulińska (Toad Press/Veliz Books, 2021), and a special issue of the journal Aufgabe devoted to Polish poetry and poetics.

He is the recipient of a 2023 PEN/Heim Translation Grant, a 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Translation fellowship, a research fellowship from the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, and a 2021–22 grant from the Citizen Diplomacy Action Fund. He is on faculty at the University of Łódź, where he teaches in the Department of North American literature and culture.