Featuring work from throughout his illustrious career, Footprints on Water marks the United States debut of Dato Magradze, who has earned international acclaim, including the Europe International Medal from Pope Benedict XVI, for his collection ¿Salve¿; the Golden Feather from the International Federation of Journalists in 2005, for his text for the Georgian national anthem; and an international medal from the Academy of Culture of Verona, for his work promoting free speech. From the striking minimalism of ¿Caravan¿ to the genre-transcending epic of ¿Giacomo Ponti,¿ this collection not only explores but transgresses the formal boundaries of poetics.

Dato (David) Magradze was born in 1962; in 1984 he graduated from Tbilisi State University, Faculty of Philology.

He has published several collections of poems, including Marula (1987), Nikala (2002), Salve (2004), Nafexurebi cyalze (The Steps on the Water) (2011), and Giacomo Ponti (2011). His books have been translated into Armenian, English, German, Italian, Russian, and Turkish.

Between 1984 and 1992, he worked for various magazines and then as editor of the literary magazine Tsiskari. From 1992 to 1995, he was the Minister of Culture of Georgia and has served as a Member of the Georgian Parliament. From 1991 until 2010, he was the Director of Georgian PEN.

He has won many awards including, in 2005, the Golden Feather from the International Federation of Journalists for his text for the Georgian National Anthem. In 2008, he received the Europe International Medal from Pope Benedict XVI for his collection Salve. In 2009, the Academy of Culture of Verona awarded Dato Magradze and Anton Mazreku (an Albanian poet) an international medal, for their work promoting freedom of speech.