Join the Department of Germanic Languages as we welcome three visiting authors for an afternoon of author readings and discussion of contemporary trends and questions in German Literature: what are some of the current trends and themes? How do literature and politics intersect? What role do both transnationalism and nation play in the self-understanding of authors, in the ways that literature circulates? How does contemporary German literature cross boundaries of genre - between prose and poetry, narrative and performance, fiction and documentation, literary text and film script? And how do these authors approach their own work: how, in other words, do they write?

Professors Kristin Dickinson (German) and Johannes von Moltke (German/SAC) will moderate. Readings will be in German, with text available in English translation. The discussion will be in English.

Selim Özdogan is the 2016 Max Kade Visiting Author at the University of Michigan. He is a bilingual author of Turkish heritage. His first novel was published in 1995, and he has since then published 10 novels and 4 short story collections. His most recent book Wieso Heimat, ich wohne zur Miete (Who Said Home, I’m Only Renting) follows its protagonist Krishna Mustafa from Freiburg, Germany to Istanbul, where he hopes to discover his roots but ends up amid the protests against Erdogan at Gezi Park. Özdogan has received numerous awards and fellowships, including the Adelbert von Chamisso Prize (1999). He also works as a columnist for the newspaper Zeit Online.

Kerstin Hensel is a renowned German author who works across a vast array of genres. Though she returns most often to lyric poetry, she has penned radio features and operas, screenplays, short stories, novels, plays and children’s stories. Hensel grew up and studied in the former GDR, and has held teaching appointments at the film academy in Potsdam, the German Institute for Literature in Leipzig, and currently at the Hochschule für Schauspielkunst (Acting Academy) “Ernst Busch” in Berlin, where she teaches poetry. Hensel is the recipient of the Anna-Seghers prize, the Lessing Prize, and the Walter-Bauer prize in literature, and of a fellowship at the Villa Massimo in Rome. She is a member of the Akademie der Künste (Academy of Arts), whose Literature Section she co-directs with Ulrich Peltzer.

Ulrich Peltzer is the author of numerous books and two screenplays. His novel Bryant Park creates a vivid montage of New York City in the tradition of Dos Passos but under the impression of 9/11. His most recent novel, Das bessere Leben (The Better Life) continues to elaborate Peltzer’s vivid, hard-driving style as it explores the world of finance capital against the backdrop of terror and utopia. Winner of the Heinrich-Böll, Marieluise-Fleißer, and Peter-Weiss prizes, among many others, Peltzer is a member of the Akademie der Künste (Academy of Arts), whose Literature Section he co-directs with Kerstin Hensel. He is a member of PEN Germany and was elected to the German Academy for Language and Literature (Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung) in 2015.