Dainius Gintalas was born in 1973 in Slabadėlė Village in western Lithuania. He studied Lithuanian philology at Vilnius University and art criticism at the Vilnius Academy of Art. He is a poet, translator, and librettist who has published three poetry collections for adults: Boa (2007, Young Yotvingian Prize), Needles (2016, Poetry Book of the Year), One Summer’s Song (2021); and he has published two collections for children: Make Way for the Hippo! (2019, Poetry Spring Prize for Children’s Poetry), Sweetflag Jelly, or Crows, Icicles, Monitor Lizards and Frogs (2011). He wrote the librettos for musicals of various genres. Gintalas has translated Society of the Spectacle by Debord, Lautreamont’s Les Chants de Maldoror, as well as poetry by Michaux, Cendrars, Char, Artaud and more. He lives in Vilnius. From a small farm in the Ukmergė region he hosts a nonprofessional artists’ gathering called the Maskoliškės Art Front where work is exhibited in a barn.