US AND THEM
Common Ground. Literature from Southeast Europe
#commonground #traduki #wirundsie
SEE YOU NEXT TIME!
The Leipzig Book Fair 2023 takes place 23- 26 March 2023.
This year, Common Ground – Literature from Southeast Europe is for the third and final time the Region in Focus at the Leipzig Book Fair. Unfortunately, and to our great dismay, the Leipzig Book Fair 2022 has been cancelled. But, nevertheless, our programme featuring books, authors, music and films will be presented in a slightly altered fashion in Leipzig as well as online under this year’s motto “US AND THEM”.
Our famous Balkannacht and the Balkan Film Week will take place as usual at the UT Connewitz in Leipzig. In addition, fascinating talks with authors will be taking place in Leipzig and online.
Participants
Petar Andonovski
Lindita Arapi
Ralf Beste
Ivana Bodrožić
Stefan Bošković
Lavinia Braniște
Marianna Georgieva
Georgi Gospodinov
Ismar Hačam
Aleksandar Hemon
Nataša Kramberger
Ulrich Ladurner
Luljeta Lleshanaku
Norbert Mappes-Niediek
Barbi Marković
Miha Mazzini
Pantaloons
Radmila Petrović
Jörg Plath
Manuel Sarrazin
Tino Schlench
Ana Schnabl
Pajtim Statovci
Hana Stojić
Tanja Stupar Trifunović
Tatiana Țîbuleac
Annemarie Türk
Team US AND THEM
Florian Valerius
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Natasha Atanasova
Petar Andonovski
Petar Andonovski was born in 1987, in Kumanovo, North Macedonia. He studied general and comparative literature at the University of Cyril and Methodius in Skopje. He has published one poetry collection and four novels, including The Summer You Weren’t There (2020, first Macedonian queer novel). In 2015, his novel The Body One Must Live In won the national award for Novel of the Year. Fear of Barbarians received the 2020 European Union Prize for Literature. His novels have been translated into: English, French, Serbian, Bulgarian.
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Stephan Boltz
Lindita Arapi
Lindita Arapi, born in Albania, belongs to the circle of the so-called Albanian literary avant-garde. She publishes poetry collections, novels, essays and journalistic pieces. Her first novel, Schlüsselmädchen, was awarded the Book of the Year Award by Kult Academy in Albania and translated into German. Her most recent novel, Die Eingemauerte, is currently being translated into German and is forthcoming in Weidle Verlag. In addition to her writing, Lindita Arapi works as a freelance radio editor for Deutsche Welle (Bonn) and translator.
(c) picture alliance dpa Kay Nietfeld
Ralf Beste
Since February 2022 Ralf Beste is Head of the Department for Culture and Society at the Federal Foreign Office. Beste, born in 1966 in Witten, studied history in Bochum, Bielefeld and Baltimore. After an internship at Ruhr Nachrichten, he worked for more than 20 years as an editor (for example at SPIEGEL). In 2014, he became Deputy Head of the Planning Staff at the Federal Foreign Office, in 2016 Commissioner for Strategic Communication, and in 2017 Head of the Planning Staff. From 2019 to the beginning of 2022, Beste was Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the Republic of Austria.
Tomislav Marić
Ivana Bodrožić
Ivana Simić Bodrožić was born in 1982 in Vukovar. She studied Croatian Literature and Philosophy in Zagreb. She published her first volume of poetry in 2005; since then, her poetry has been printed in international literary magazines and anthologies. She has received several prizes, including the Kiklop Prize (2010) for her debut novel Hotel Zagorje. In 2020 she published her novel Sinovi, kćeri.
Dado Ljaljević
Stefan Bošković
Stefan Bošković was born in 1983 in Podgorica. His books include the short story collection Transparentne životinje (Transparent Animals, 2018) and the novel Šamaranje (Slap in the Face, 2014), awarded the 2014 prize for the best manuscript novel in Montenegro. In 2016, he won second prize at the Festival of European Short Stories for Fashion and Friends. Bošković has written scripts for a feature-length film, several short films, a sitcom series and a number of documentaries. Several of his short plays have been staged. His novel The Minister, for which he received the EU Literature Prize, is published in German translation in March 2022.
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Cosmin Gogu
Lavinia Braniște
Lavinia Braniște was born in 1983, in Brăila. She studied foreign languages in Cluj-Napoca and Bucharest. Lavinia worked as a language teacher and translator and has translated over forty books from English, French and Spanish. She has published three novels so far: Interior Zero, Sonia ridică mâna and Mă găsești când vrei. Lavinia also writes children’s literature, some of her books were included in the White Ravens catalogue in 2017 and 2019, respectively. Lavinia currently lives in her hometown, Brăila, and dedicates herself to writing.
Tzveti Pavlova
Marianna Georgieva
Marianna Georgieva was born in 1986 in Ufa, Republic of Bashkortostan, in the Russian Federation. She studied law, creative writing as well as artistic psycho-social practices and psychodrama. She made her debut in 2014 with the novel Der Schuldner. 2016 saw the publication of her first poetry collection Exotische Arten, einen Vogel zu zerschneiden, followed by her second poetry collection ausweg in 2020. She is the editor of the online journal http://www.freepoetrysociety.com.
Svetla Stoyanova
Georgi Gospodinov
Georgi Gospodinov (1968) is a leading Bulgarian writer, the author of Natural Novel and The Physics of Sorrow, among many other books. He is winner of the Central European Angelus Award (2019), the Jan Michalski Prize (2016) and many other accolades. Recently, Gospodinov was awarded the Usedom Prize (Germany, 2021) for contribution to the European literature by a jury presided by Olga Tokarczuk. His latest novel, Time Shelter (Zeitzuflucht), was published in the spring of 2020 during the first lockdown and is forthcoming in more than fifteen countries, among them Germany (Aufbau), France (Gallimard), US (Liveright/Norton). In 2021, Time Shelter won the prestigious Italian award Premio Strega Europeo.
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Alex Goldberg
Ismar Hačam
Ismar Hačam was born in 1991 in Livno (Bosnia and Herzegovina). He studied German language and literature in Sarajevo, Würzburg and Berlin. He currently lives in Berlin, where he organises, curates, and moderates literary events.
Velibor Bozović
Aleksandar Hemon
Aleksandar Hemon is the author of The Lazarus Project, which was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award, and three collections of short stories: The Question of Bruno; Nowhere Man, which was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; and Love and Obstacles. Born in Sarajevo, Hemon visited Chicago in 1992, intending to stay for a matter of months. While he was there, Sarajevo came under siege, and he was unable to return home. Hemon wrote his first story in English in 1995. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2003 and a “genius grant” from the MacArthur Foundation in 2004. Meine Eltern / Alles nicht dein Eigen was published in German translation in 2021. He lives in Chicago with his wife and daughter.
Daniele Croci
Nataša Kramberger
Nataša Kramberger, born 1983, is a writer, columnist, and organic farmer. She writes essays, reportages and commentaries for newspapers and magazines. For her debut novel Nebesa v robidah (2007) she received the European Union Prize for Literature (EUPL) in 2010. In 2011, she published Kaki vojaki (with Jana Kocjan), in 2014 an essay collection titled Brez zidu, and in 2016 Tujčice. Verfluchte Misteln (2021) was published in Slovene under the title Primerljivi hektarji in 2018. In summer she lives in Jurovski Dol, Slovenia, and runs a small biodynamic farm with the eco-art collective Zelena Centrala. In winter she lives in Berlin.
Ulli Idomeni
Ulrich Ladurner
Ulrich Ladurner, born in South Tyrol, is foreign editor of the Hamburg weekly DIE ZEIT since 1999. He reported from the former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and other crisis areas. Since 2016, he has been head of DIE ZEIT’s European office in Brussels. His latest book: Der Fall Italien. Wenn Gefühle die Politik beherrschen (Edition Körber, 2020).
Lulezim Haziri
Luljeta Lleshanaku
Luljeta Lleshanaku is an Albanian poet. She is the author of nine poetry collections in her language, which are widely translated and published in other languages. Her last book in English, Negative Space, was a winner of the “English PEN” award, a finalist for the “GRIFFIN International Poetry Prize 2019” in Canada and a finalist for “PEN America 2019”. She is also the author of two poetry collections in German language: Kinder der Nature published with the support of TRADUKI by Edition Korrespondenzen (2010), and Die Stadt der Äpfel, published in 2021 by Hanser Literaturverlage.
Stella Kager
Norbert Mappes-Niediek
Norbert Mappes-Niediek, born 1953, is a journalist and publicist, since 1991-2017 active as South-East Europe correspondent for German, Dutch, Swiss and Austrian newspapers as well as for Deutschlandfunk. Author of non-fiction books on the region, most recently Arme Roma, böse Zigeuner (Berlin 2012) und Europas geteilter Himmel (Berlin 2021).
Apollonia Theresa Bitzan