Bettina Rolyn studied Politics, Languages and Culture at Claremont McKenna College (BA) and served in the US Army from 2003 to 2007, where she learned Persian and was trained as a human intelligence collector. She was medically discharged and later earned a master's degree in Persian language and culture. After leaving a career in the defense industry, she studied theology in Stuttgart, Germany, and then completed her MFA in Creative Non-Fiction at Carlow University in Pittsburgh. Her writing and poetry have appeared in Stadtsprachen Magazine, The War Horse, and The Wrath-Bearing Tree, among others, and she publishes in her Substack newsletter. She is currently working on a memoir about her experiences as a woman in the US Army and writing essays. She has lived and worked as a translator, creative writer, and editor in Berlin since 2018.
What brought you to Berlin? Love? World politics? Or was it a coincidence?
Fate and karma first brought me here for a visit at the age of 14, then I came for an exchange year in 10th grade and I've been coming back ever since. Like a cat with many lives, I came here on a freelance visa in 2018 and stayed.
What do you love about Berlin?
Die Vielfalt. There is something for everyone here. The constant exchange between artists, creatives, and international cultures creates an atmosphere of personal development and self-awareness.
What do you miss in Berlin?
The sun and the Mediterranean.
What is your favorite spot in Berlin?
The Holzmarkt, the Spree, all the Berlin state museums.
Would you say you are a different person in Berlin? A different translator? And if yes, in what way?
I'm still an accidental ambassador for my country, but it's only since moving here that I've started writing seriously. So my identity here has opened up and expanded far beyond my origins, but still remains shaped by them. I feel free here in a way that, interestingly, I couldn't feel in the “land of the free.”
Which existing literary work do you wish you had written?
My memoirs, my novel and my poems ... there is still so much I want to have had written. I admire a lot of Annie Ernaux, and many women veteran writers who have shown me the way.
Finalist De Groot Foundation Courage to Write Grant, Spring 2023
Radial Stipendium for translating German literature into English, November 2022 - TOLEDO Programm Deutscher Übersetzerfonds
