“Every language I know shapes my worldview, i.e. my poetry as well. It’s worth learning a new language just for the privilege of entering its poems on your own two feet.” - a translator, poet, and lecturer Rūta Burbaitė shares her views on multilingualism and its creative impact. In this interview, Burbaitė opens up about the life of an artist and discusses the relationship between translation and poetry that fosters creativity in her everyday life. 

What inspires your poetry the most? Are there any poets whose works influence your poems? 

Beyond life itself, I think I’m inspired by all the brilliant minds I’ve ever admired. From my high-school favourites — Vaičiūnaitė, Radauskas, Mačernis, Miliauskaitė — to the Greek Nobel laureates. Seferis, whom I wrote my BA thesis on, and Elytis, whom I had the pleasure and honour to translate into Lithuanian. And right now, a poet who never ceases to inspire me is Mary Oliver.

Have you ever found that translating someone else’s work unlocks new ideas for your own writing?

Yes. The process itself is creatively demanding: it forces me to rethink meaning, structure, and nuance. That mental effort strengthens neural connections, and the associations that form during translation can later inspire original ideas in my own texts. Or just remind me what a beautiful space to withdraw into poetry is.

Have you written any poems that are particularly important to you? If yes, perhaps you could share their story.

I tend to detach from my work once it’s shared with others. At that point, as Barthes suggests, the reader becomes a co-creator of the text. So when my poems enter the world, I no longer feel like their author as much as another reader encountering them anew. The personal stories no longer matter — the poem does.

Do you have any special rituals that help you create?

Simply living. Moving through beautiful periods, through sad ones, and through those moments when beauty and sadness overlap.

What is the biggest challenge that you face when writing?

Sharing. Poetry stems from a very different side of creativity, a far more vulnerable one than the voice I use in seminars or when translating for the University. For me, it takes much more courage to share a poem than to give a talk to my students on critical discourse analysis.

Does your understanding of other languages outside Lithuanian impact your ideas and poetry?

Oh, absolutely. Every language I know shapes my worldview, i.e. my poetry as well. It’s worth learning a new language just for the privilege of entering its poems on your own two feet. Highly recommend.

Are there words or concepts in one language that you wish existed in the other? How do you navigate those gaps — as a poet and as a translator?

Yes, and they are the gems! Words like φιλότιμο or αγάπη show it perfectly. As translators, we do try, of course, but it’s a beautifully lost battle: worth fighting, even though we know we’ll never fully win.

Do you ever find that translation constraints actually spark poetic creativity?

When you are a creative spirit per se, rules always evoke that natural side of you. And so do challenges! Like counting syllables and looking for that (almost) perfect rhyme. The specific forms of poetry, such as the sonnet, were not developed by chance. These are linguistic diamonds, and no diamond comes into being without pressure.