A Celebration of the Opening of the Frankfurt Book Fair
While Frankfurt sleeps and the New Zealand Pavilion lies empty, waiting to be filled within hours by the crowds, we create another pavilion at the opposite end of the world to celebrate New Zealand as Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair.
Ours is a smaller pavilion in a borrowed lounge bar in an alley in Wellington. In this dawn pavilion—slightly off the beaten track, slightly harder to find—you can enjoy an evening of writers and translators who may also come as a pleasant surprise in the New Zealand literary cityscape. It’s not who you’d automatically expect.
Join us for literary encounters, conversation and translation, chaired and curated by Pip Adam.
Tuesday 9 October 2012, from 6.30pm. Free entry.
Meow, 9 Edward Street, Wellington
The Temporary Literaturhaus is a project of the Goethe-Institut New Zealand, the New Zealand Book Council and the New Zealand Centre for Literary Translation, with the support of Creative New Zealand.
The poet and writer Uwe Kolbe
was born in East Berlin in 1957. After leaving school he met the German
author Franz Führmann who was to become his mentor, and it was through
Führmann that Kolbe had the opportunity to publish a number of poems.
His first book, “Hineingeboren“ (Born into), was published in Weimar.
Kolbe’s work was highly controversial and publication of his works was
banned in the GDR. As a result of this, Kolbe worked increasingly as a
translator of among others, the Spanish author, García Lorcas. As
co-editor of the magazine Mikado he was able to circumvent his
publication ban and continue to publish his own works. In 1985 Kolbe
travelled in Western Europe and was a visiting lecturer at universities
in Austin, Texas and Vienna. He moved to Hamburg in 1987 and received
many prizes and awards, most recently, the Heinrich Mann Prize from the
Academy of the Arts in Berlin in 2012. Between 1997 and 2002 he was head
of the studio of literature and theatre at the University of Tübingen.
Since then he has returned to live in Berlin and is one of Germany’s
most well-known contemporary authors.
Brigitte Oleschinski
was born in Köln in 1955. She studied Political Science at the Free
University in Berlin and worked as a contemporary historian on issues
concerning political repression in totalitarian systems. She has worked
as a guest lecturer and translator, participated in poetry performances
and collaborated on the internet project www.neuedichte.de. Oleschinski
has published a poetry collection including “Mental Heat Control“ and
“Your Passport is Not Guilty“ and was awarded the Peter Huchel Prize in
1998, the Ernst Meister Prize in 2001 and in 2004 the Erich Fried Prize.
From 2003 and 2005, together with Indonesian artists, she performed the
poetry performance “Laut Lesung” (According to Reading) in Germany,
Indonesia and Mexico. Her poetry collection „Geisterströmung“ was
published in 2004. She currently lives in Berlin as a freelance writer.
Ulrike Almut Sandig was
born in 1979 in Großenhain and grew up near Dresden. Together with
Marlen Pelny, she set up the literature project “augenpost”. After
beginning a degree in journalism, she graduated with a master’s degree
in Religious Studies and modern Indian Studies and made extended
language study trips to India. Her first poetry collection “Zunder” was
published in 2005, followed by “streumen” in 2007, for which Sandig was
supported with a residency in Sydney. In 2006 Sandig was awarded the
Meran Poetry Prize. Sandig has published poems, prose and radio stories
and between 2007 and 2009 she was the editor of the literary magazine
EDIT. The Südwestrundfunk radio station broadcast her first radio play
“Hush little Baby” in 2008, directed by Robert Schoen. Her second radio
play “Unter Wasser”, was broadcast in April 2010 and directed by Judith
Lorentz. In 2009 Sandig was awarded the Leonce and Lena Prize. For her
collection of stories “Flamingos”, which was published in 2010, Sandig
was awarded a scholarship to spend time at the Literarisches Colloquium
in Berlin.