Bulgarian readers made contact with Japanese poetry through the French and German translations of Japanese poems. The first book of haiku, Palnolunie (Full Moon), translated from the original Japanese by Lyudmila Holodovich and Georgi Vasilev, appeared in 1985. The first collection of haiku by a Bulgarian poet, Dimitar Stefanov, appeared in 1988. The Bulgarian Haiku Club was founded in 2000 in Sofia, followed by the Haiku Club Plovdiv in 2004 and the Haiku Club Sofia (HCS) in 2005.

Ludmila Balabanova (Людмила Балабанова), born 1949, Novi Pazar, Bulgaria, lecturer in computer engineering, poet, and theorist. Published four collections of haiku and haibun; won two Touchstone Distinguished Book Awards. Edited the trilingual haiku anthology Огледала / Mirrors / Miroirs. Her PhD dissertation on the power of the unsaid in haiku was published in 2014. Recognized in haiku contests at the Basho 360th Anniversary festivities in Japan, the 2nd European Haiku Conference, Vadstena, Sweden, and the International Haiku Festival, Constanța, Romania, among others. Served as president of Haiku Club Sofia. Coauthor of the Haikupedia article “Haiku in Bulgaria.” Resides in Sofia.