Events - 16.11.2016 - 00:00
17. November 2016. Ever since her successful first book, "Sommerhaus, später", Judith Hermann has been known for her unmistakeable voice and for the elegance and beauty of her language. In her new book of short stories, "Lettipark", she places the words between which the drama of existence manifests itself with as much concentration as lightness. What happens when we meet someone? How close can we be to those we love?
Intense encounters
Encounters, brief moments which can change everything – these are the stories that Judith Hermann tells. A glance or a touch suddenly results in closeness. Or people grow apart. Hermann’s protagonists are sometimes completely defenseless, but their encounters with other, loved or unfamiliar, people are that much more intense. These moments occur at random and without excitement, and under their surface burst into existential force. In her narratives, Hermann pins down these moments that can decide everything: our loneliness, rage and yearning.
Award-winning writer
Judith Hermann was born in 1970 in Berlin, where she still lives. Her first book, "Sommerhaus, später", resulted in her literary breakthrough in 1998. Her first work was awarded numerous prizes: the Incentive Prize of the Bremen Prize for Literature (1999), the Hugo Ball Prize (1999) and the Kleist Prize (2001). In 2003, the book of short stories, "Nichts als Gespenster" was published. Some of these stories were made into films in 2007. Her third book, "Alice", earned Judith Hermann the Friedrich Hölderlin Prize in 2009. In 2014, Hermann published her first novel, "Aller Liebe Anfang". She was awarded the Erich Fried Prize in the same year.
Photo: Photocase / designritter