15 October 2019

etc is poetry: Poetry, Poetics, Positions
Focus on poetry at Akademie der Künste on 25–26 October

With Nico Bleutge, Nora Bossong, Michael Braun, Volker Braun, Ann Cotten, Ulrike Draesner, Harald Hartung, Kerstin Hensel, Julia Kadel, Ursula Krechel, Michael Lentz, Fiston Mwanza Mujila, Angelika Niescier, Steffen Popp, Monika Rinck, Thomas Rosenlöcher, Kathrin Schmidt, Daniela Seel, Aleš Šteger, Ulf Stolterfoht, Sebastian Unger, Anja Utler, Insa Wilke and Ron Winkler

As in 2017, the Literature Section of the Akademie der Künste will once again put poetry at the centre of its programme activities and determine where it stands. The poetry boom continues unabated, as contemporary poetry's myriad of voices and high quality win widespread acclaim. The last 20 years have been hailed as the “heyday of German poetry”. Poetry festivals are experiencing record attendance; a multi-day festival congress (Fokus Lyrik) has begun taking stock; and classifying studies like Christian Metz's Poetisch denken and new anthologies such as Steffen Popp's Spitzen or Jan Wagner and Federico Italiano's Grand Tour are being published. We might conclude that there has never been this much poetry. But how is the book market really doing? And more importantly, what has changed aesthetically in recent decades? What is the connection to earlier poets and tradition? What is or can a poem be? How is poetry affected by an increasingly event-like quality and by the “performative turn”?

The programme will commence with a lecture by Michael Lentz on the tension between writing and voice. Poets will talk in tandem about their poetry and poetologies. Monika Rinck and Cologne saxophonist Angelika Niescier will conduct a dialogue across genres. A panel discussion will critically examine poetry's progress over the last 20 years. On Poetry Night, 17 poets will read their poems, and two of the most distinguished voices in Germany's contemporary jazz scene, Angelika Niescier (sax) and Julia Kadel (piano), will perform together. Both days will also offer writing workshops for school children, led by Kerstin Hensel, Thomas Rosenlöcher and Ulf Stolterfoht. At 3 pm on October 26, Kerstin Hensel, Thomas Rosenlöcher and Kathrin Schmidt will read poems and stories to children aged five and up.

Complete programme at www.adk.de

Event dates
etc is poetry*
Poetry, Poetics, Positions
Lecture, Talks, Poetry Night
Friday, 25 October 2019, from 6 pm
Saturday, 26 October 2019, from 5:30 pm
€ 8/6 each, combined ticket € 14/9
Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin
Press tickets at presse@adk.de, Tel. 030 20057-1514
Ticket reservation T +49 (0)30 20057-1000, ticket@adk.de
Tickets online www.adk.de/tickets
* Ernst Jandl, “easy grammar poem”