Pioneering New Zealand writers leading the way into Europe

Join Elizabeth Knox, Jenny Pattrick, Damien Wilkins and Fergus Barrowman as they share their experiences of one of Europe’s premier literary events, the Leipzig Book Fair and Festival.

Four Wellingtonians have been part of New Zealand’s advance party into Europe as the literary world gears up for this year’s Frankfurt Book Fair devoted to New Zealand books. You can hear more about them, their experiences and how they think New Zealand’s literature will be received at the world’s biggest literary event in October. This event will be chaired by Anne Chamberlain (Director, Writers&Readers Week)

LEIPZIG READS at Cafe Meow, 6pm on 24th April. A Temporary Literaturhaus event.

From Germany to NZ: Inka Parei in Wellington on 23rd March

German writer Inka Parei has been blogging from a campervan on the South Island as part of a mobile writer’s residency sponsored by the Goethe-Institut. You can read about her travels so far here. Inka’s first novel in English-language translation The Shadow Boxing Woman was published by Seagull last year. Inka and her translator Katy Derbyshire were recently nominated for the Best Translated Book Award. Inka’s second and third novels are also being translated by Katy for Seagull Books, and you can get a preview in the current issue of Sport.

Come along and meet Inka in Wellington on Friday 23^rd March. This time the Temporary Literaturhaus will be “housed” by the Goethe-Institut in Wellington. Join us at 17.30 for a glass of wine before we get going at 18.00. Please RSVP by 21^st March to arts@wellington.goethe.org.

Venue: Goethe-Institut, 150 Cuba Street

RSVP by 21^st March to arts@wellington.goethe.org.

Jenny Erpenbeck in Wellington

“For a time this lake would hold up its mirror to the sky amid the Brandenburg hills, it would lie smooth between the oaks, alders and pines that were growing once more, and much later, after human beings appeared, it was given a name by them: Märkisches Meer.”

 Jenny Erpenbeck, Visitation, tr. Susan Bernofsky

The German title of Jenny Erpenbeck’s most recent novel is Heimsuchung, a word that contains the idea of home, of searching, of searching for home, of haunting, of punishment and affliction, all of which echo through the story of a house on the shore of a Brandenburg lake, built on a plot of land with a dark past. The English title Visitation also evokes visits, visitors and being visited, picking up on the ways in which the house is haunted by the passing of people and of time. Time and its passage are also the elusive substance of Jenny Erpenbeck’s  collection Dinge, die verschwinden, a book of farewells that explores disappearances of various kinds: of youth, memories, objects, and always, inescapably, of the present. An extract, translated by Susan Bernofsky, is included in the current issue of Sport. Wellingtonians can listen to Jenny Erpenbeck in conversation with Karen Leeder (Professor of German at Oxford University and also an expert on literary spectres and hauntings) at her Writers & Readers Week session on Monday 12 March. Karen will also be chairing a session on the art of literary translation with Jenny Erpenbeck and translators and poets Michael Hulse and Marco Sonzogni on Tuesday 13 March.

PS. Susan Bernofsky was recently awarded the prestigious and princely (15,000 Euro) Hermann Hesse Prize for her translation of Siddharta. Congratulations Susan!

Mobile German Writer in NZ

German writer Inka Parei landed in New Zealand just in time for the “weather bomb” that announced the start of March. She will be travelling around the country in a campervan as part of a mobile writer’s residency sponsored by the Goethe-Institut. Readers will be able to follow her journey in German, English and Te Reo here. Inka recently appeared at the Festival Neue Literature in New York with five other contemporary German-language writers. She is the author of three novels, most recently Die Kältezentrale (for further info and an extract in English see the Festival Neue Literatur’s website). Her debut, published in English as The Shadow Boxing Woman by Seagull last year, has just been nominated for the Best Translated Book Award. Katy Derbyshire, the book’s English-language translator, is currently working on Inka’s second novel, to be published in English by Seagull as What Darkness Was (you can get a preview in the brand new issue of Sport).

Inka will be speaking about her work and her NZ travels at a Temporary Literaturhaus event in Wellington on Friday 23^rd March.

What's on in Wellington and Beyond

February has been a busy month for many Temporary Literaturhaus participants. Here in Wellington the Fringe Festival is in full swing. If, like me, you didn’t catch Lorenzo Bühne at his first Fringe gig, you can head down to Happy on 29^th Feb where he will be performing tracks from his brand-new album Wild Iron: New Zealand Poetry Adapted to Song. I had an excellent reason for not seeing the first show – I was listening to “edgy words” with four poets including Aleksandra Lane, whose first book in English (yes, she has two in Serbian already!) Birds of Clay had been launched a few days earlier. I can highly recommend Aleks’s poetry – and also her family’s Serbian home cooking and the gypsy music performed by her friends. This week Tina Makereti has also been having some multilingual adventures – read an interview here about the German translation of her work. Elizabeth Knox, who wrote a new Grim/m fairytale for our Lithaus launch, will be among the NZ writers travelling to Leipzig for the book fair next month, but in the next couple of weeks she’ll be appearing at literary festivals in Beijing and Shanghai. Hinemoana Baker is also on the road, with a poetry reading in New York next week. Right now I am eying the first (and currently only) bound proof of next month’s “Sport” with contributions from NZ and German writers (and their translators) including various Temporary Literaturhaus participants. The volume will be launched at Writers and Readers Week, which is drawing ever closer. I’m looking forward to the session with Jenny Erpenbeck (read an extract from Visitation here), discussions about the art of translation and a poetry masterclass with Bill Manhire – the names of the three chosen poets have been announced…

PS And the NZ International Arts Festival kicks off tonight!

Looking forward...

A big thank-you to all those who participated in the launch of the Temporary Literaturhaus. It was a great week, but don’t despair if you missed it – the Temporary Literaturhaus will be returning towards the end of March and acclaimed German writer Inka Parei will be putting in an appearance. In the meantime, Wellingtonians can look forward to Writers and Readers Week.

NEWSLETTER for the Temporary Literaturhaus

If you would like to receive updates about Temporary Literaturhaus events and other literary happenings in Wellington please write to us at literaturhausnz@gmail.com and ask to be added to our email list. The launch week starts on 7th February!