Interview with Egana Dzhabbarova

Abstract

Egana Dzhabbarova is a poetess, a novelist, and PhD. She was born and raised in Ekaterinburg by Azerbaijani parents. Her life has been characterized by continuous moves from Russia to Istanbul, Baku and then Germany (with a year-long stay in Taiwan in 2022).
She is the author of the novels Руки женщин моей семьи были не для письма (The Hands of My Family’s Women Were Not for Writing, No Kidding Press, Dzhabbarova 2023), Дуа за неверного (Dua for the Infidel, NLO, Dzhabbarova 2024), Terra Nullius (NLO, Dzhabbarova 2025) and of the poetry collections Босфор (Bosphorus, Dzhabbarova 2015), Поза Ромберга (Romberg’s Pose, Dzhabbarova 2017), Красная кнопка тревоги (Red Alert Button, Dzhabbarova 2020) and the collection Деколониальность: настоящее и будущее. Сборник статей (Decoloniality: Present and Future, Gorizontal’, Dzhabbarova 2022). Her poems have been shortlisted for the Arkadii Dragomoshchenko Prize (2019) and published in international anthologies, such as F-Letter (Britain), DEARS (Switzerland), and PENopp (Sweden).
In this interview, Dzhabbarova reflects on autofiction as a form of resistance, on Russophone literature beyond the imperial canon, and on writing in Russian in the context of war, exile, and dissent. The interview was conducted by Michela Romano in May 2025.