poesiefestival berlin: Ah, Europe
27.04.2017
The 18th poesiefestival berlin: Europe_ Fata Morgana is host to some 170 poets from 42 countries from 16 to 24 June 2017. A Word, Please, Europe brings together poetic perspectives from the outside from 22 countries neighbouring the European Union into a unique multi-lingual installation. This year’s VERSschmuggel/reVERSible is an encounter between Kurdish and German, and Poetry and Propaganda is a discussion of how language, specifically poetic expression, can produce power.
A Word, Please, Europe
Sunday, 18 June, 8 pm
22 poets from the countries neighbouring the European Union are coming together at the 18th poesiefestival berlin for a poetic installation. They include Abbas Beydoun (Lebanon), a co-founder of the second Arabic modernism; Monzer Masri (Syria), who is sparking debate with his ‘counter-poetry’ which goes beyond expectations of form and content; and Sjón (Iceland), who is famous for his lyrics for Björk in Lars von Trier’s Dancer in the Dark. How is the idea of Europe seen outside the European Community? The poets will be providing their poetic answers to a Europe shaken to its foundations, presenting their texts about realities, dreams and fears as a polyglot sound collage.
‘A Word, Please, Europe’ is taking place in co-operation with the Forum Berlin of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation and is supported by the Auswärtiges Amt.
VERSschmuggel/reVERSible Kurdish-German
Tuesday, 20 June, 7.30 pm
For the first time Kurdish poetry is taking the stage at a festival in Germany. Despite centuries of repression, Kurdish, with its long oral tradition, is one of the world’s oldest languages. The richness of Kurdish history and culture is reflected in the multitude of dialects and different writing systems. The Kurdish-German VERSschmuggel / reVERSible provides six Kurdish and six German poets with the freedom to experiment, translating each other in pairs in a three-day workshop, starting from gloss translations of each others‘ poems and with interpreters to enable them to communicate. The translations produced in the workshops will then be read during the 18th poesiefestival berlin.
The Kurdish poets reading are Eskerê Boyîk (Armenia), Yildiz Çakar (Turkey), Kerîm Kurmanc (Iran), Fatma Savci (Turkey and Sweden), Anahîta Şêxê (Syria) and Mueyed Teyîb (Iraq) with their German counterparts Mirko Bonné, Carolin Callies, Simone Kornappel, José Oliver, Ilma Rakusa and Tobias Roth.
‘VERSschmuggel/reVERSible Kurdish-German’ is supported by the Auswärtiges Amt and the Prussian Maritime Trade Foundation and is taking place in co-operation with Literature Across Frontiers/Literary Europe Live, with support from the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union. Thanks to Övgü Gökçe Yaşa, programme co-ordinator with Diyarbakır Sanat Merkezi.
Poetry and Propaganda
Friday, 23 June, 7.30 pm
What is happening today to our language in analogue and digital media? How are opinions made, how is political reality created with words and what is the role played in this by its aesthetic function that seduces, damns and invents? An inter-disciplinary panel discussion at the 18th poesiefestival berlin will be exploring the complex interplay between poetry, rhetoric and politics. Formed language as an instrument of various political groupings will be discussed and poetry in the service of radical political programmes in literary history and in the present will be in the spotlight, taking present-day examples such as the propaganda poems of IS and the linguistic self-enactment of the new ‘populists’.
Taking part in the discussion will be Paula Diehl, political scientist (Bielefeld), Ursula Krechel, writer (Berlin), Philippe Joseph Salazar, philosopher and professor for rhetoric (Cape Town) and Joseph Vogl, cultural and literary scholar (Berlin), moderated by Eva Geulen of the Centre for Literary Research, Berlin.
‘Poetry and Propaganda’ is supported by the Centre for Literary and Cultural Research Berlin.
18th poesiefestival berlin: Europe_ Fata Morgana
16-24 June 2017
Academy of Arts, Hanseatenweg 10, 10557 Berlin
The poesiefestival berlin is a project by the Haus für Poesie in co-operation with the Academy of Arts and gratefully acknowledges the support of the Hauptstadtkulturfonds and the Auswärtiges Amt.
Press photos for download: www.haus-fuer-poesie.org/de/presse
Festival programme and advance ticket sales online from 11 May at www.haus-fuer-poesie.org
Accreditation at presse@haus-fuer-poesie.org
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