Of Strangers and Bees

Hamid Ismailov is an Uzbek writer who was forced to flee Uzbekistan in 1992 due to what the state dubbed 'unacceptable democratic tendencies'. He came to the United Kingdom, where he took a job with the BBC World Service. His works are banned in Uzbekistan. Several of his Russian-original novels have been published in English translation, including The Railway (Vintage, 2007), The Dead Lake, which was long listed for the 2015 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, and The Underground (both Restless Books). The Devils' Dance was the first of his Uzbek language novels to appear in English, and won the EBRD Prize in 2019. Shelley Fairweather-Vega is a professional Russian to English translator and an enthusiastic Uzbek to English translator in Seattle, Washington. She holds degrees in international relations from Johns Hopkins University and in Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies from the University of Washington. That background in international politics, plus a passion for puzzles, led her naturally to a career in translation, where she earns a living examining the puzzling intersections between culture and politics. Shelley runs FairVegaTranslations and FairVega Russian Library Services and is president of the Northwest Translators and Interpreters Society. Since 2006, she has worked as a freelance translator for attorneys, academics, authors and activists around the world.