Kapllani’s work as a writer, researcher and teacher centers on themes of migration and identity, borders, totalitarianism, societies in transition, and how Albanian, Balkan and (Eastern) European history has shaped public and private narratives and memories.
Since 2012, Kapllani has been living in the US, where he was a Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University and writer-in-residence at Brown University and Wellesley College.
Education
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2007: PhD of Political Science and History. Panteion University, Athens
Title of PhD thesis:
“The Quest of Otherness in Modernity, as Prerequisite for the Redefinition of the Self. The image of Albanians in the Greek Press and the image of Greeks in the Albanian Press (1991-2001)” (in Greek).
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1998: Postgraduate Certificate for Bilingual Teachers. National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Intercultural Educational Centre.
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1997: Bachelor’s Degree in Philosophy. National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Philosophy Department, Faculty of Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology.
Courses Taught
- HON 101: Global Literature: Tirana-Warsaw Express: Storytelling after the fall of the Berlin Wall
- HON 105: Philosophical Inquiry: Existentialism as fiction and lived experience
- LSP 112: Focal Point Seminar: Borders in contemporary Literature: from Albania to Arizona
- MOL 280: The Unbearable Similarity of the Other: Food, History, and Identity in the Balkans
- MOL 281: Tirana-Warsaw Express: Storytelling after the fall of the Berlin Wall
- MOL 285: The Plague: Pandemics between Fiction & Reality
- MOL 395: Foreign Languages Across the Curriculum (FLAC) for Albanian Studies
Interests
- 20th Century Albanian and Balkan/Eastern European History and Literature
- Creative Writing and Diaspora Literature
- Border Studies and Global Migration
- Modern European Philosophy
Select Publications
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A Short Border Handbook, Granta 2006 (original language Greek/Albanian)
Published so far into Greek, Albanian, English, German (forthcoming, February 2020), French, Italian, Danish, Polish, Arab (forthcoming March 2020). Adapted for the stage by Bornholm Theater in Denmark and The National Theater of the Deaf in Greece. In 2017 it won the International Literary Prize of the City of Cassino in Italy.
- Three other novels,
My Name is Europe (original language: Greek),
The Last Page (original language: Greek) and
Wrongland (original language: Albanian), have been published in Greek and Albanian, and translated into French.
- The French translation of
The Last Page (title in French
La Dernière Page (ed. Intervalles)), has been awarded the literary prize of the Salon du livre des Balkans in Paris, France and was short-listed for The Cezam Prix Litteraire Inter CE 2016.
- Wrongland (title in French,
Le Pays des Pas Perdus) has been shortlisted for the Prix : Méditerranée – Etranger.
In the News
Conferences
- September 2019: Featured author at the Annual Bookfair “Livre sur Place”, Nancy, France