site.btaUPDATED Poet Nadezhda Zaharieva, 81, Passes Away

Bulgarian poet, writer and translator Nadezhda Zaharieva has passed away, her family announced on Thursday in a Facebook post.

"With deep sorrow, we announce that our beloved mother and grandmother Nadezhda embarked on her final journey yesterday. She left a mark on the hearts of many people and will continue to live on in our memory. We will miss her endlessly. We thank everyone for the love and respect they showed her. May she rest in peace," her family wrote. 

President Iliana Iotova said in a message of condolences to Zaharieva's family and loved ones that throughout her creative career, the late Bulgarian poet remained faithful to the written word – the word that inspires hope, preserves humanity and makes the world a better place, the President's Press Secretariat said.

Zaharieva's name is invariably associated with renowned poet Damyan Damyanov, who she married as a student at the age of 19. Their marriage lasted until his passing in 1999. 

Nadezhda Zaharieva was born on November 3, 1944 in the village of Radovo (Western Bulgaria). Soon after, her family moved to the town of Sveti Vrach (today's Sandanski), where she grew up. In the third grade she enrolled in the town library, where she began to read books and dreamed of becoming a writer.

For her, reading was a conversation with the author. The first writer she met was Marko Marchevski when she was in third grade and he was visiting her school. Zaharieva wrote her first poem in eighth grade, in her first literature class. The assignment was to reflect on the image of the Bulgarian woman in Petko R. Slaveykov's works. She wondered what introduction to write about the topic and at one point the text came out in the form of a poem.

She graduated in French Studies at Sofia University.

Zaharieva wrote more than 17 books of poetry and three books of fiction. Her first book of poems was published in 1979. Her works have been translated into English, French and Slovak.

She has written hundreds of lyrics for pop artists. She has worked as a technical assistant and editor in two publications of the Union of Bulgarian Writers. She has hosted a TV show for literature. She was deputy minister of culture from September 12, 2005 to July 27, 2009.

On June 12, 2015, she was awarded the Hristo G.Danov Award for her overall contribution to Bulgarian literary culture.

For her 78th birthday in 2022, the poet published the poetry collection Capital, which includes 99 poems written over the past four years.

In an interview for BTA for her 80th anniversary, Nadezhda Zaharieva said that all poets' mission is to make an effort to change at least a little bit a person's soul for the better, whoever that person may be, and then make the world better.