HAUS FÜR POESIE

Previously, he had already published three poetry collections with kookbooks, most recently Frieden ohne Krieg (2023), for which he received, among other honors, the Literature Prize of the Cultural Circle of German Business and the Klopstock Prize. The hero of this story, called “niemand,” sets out in a red Audi A6, which he bought with his literary prize money, traveling through Austria and Germany. Along the way he meets “die zwillinge harald und helmut, die verfluchten SCHMIDTS,” Gysi, Scholz, and März [sic!], competes in a wheelchair against Alice Weidel, gets caught up in a demonstration in front of the Bundestag where left-wingers and right-wingers are “in verschiedene mikrofone das gleiche brüllen,” confers with Father Alfred, G’tt, and Gott, and runs for election as chancellor: “niemand soll bundeskanzler werden, wählt niemand” and “make germany great again (MGGA)!”

Again and again, the Audi pushes onward, keeping the “I” in motion, its identity fluid, driving it forward, for “wie ihr wisst / ist meine heimat der weg, wie ihr wisst, bin ich verpflichtet / ewig zu rollen.” Unlike Odysseus, for whom the name “niemand” becomes salvation in the fight against the Cyclops Polyphemus, this hero has no choice, knows no return, only forward motion—and that with an “UNsicherheitsgurt.” Language is stretched and expanded into a “wortschatzrüstung,” into a vehicle that presses against the boundaries of what is supposedly permitted. In doing so, the poems concern themselves with nothing less than the future of our species, for, as the poet Martina Hefter observes, despite all their despair about the world, these poems also speak of our unconditional will to save the world.

A joint event by Haus für Poesie and Suhrkamp Verlag

In reading & conversation Yevgeniy Breyger
Moderation Nadja Küchenmeister