Literaturfest: »IM OSTEN NICHTS NEUES?« HELGA SCHUBERT, LUKAS RIETZSCHEL

In the organizer's words:

Two great contemporary literary voices open our eyes. "With my stories, I wanted to reassure myself of my world," says Helga Schubert. Lukas Rietzschel, a literary star of the younger generation, adds his perspective.

A young woman walks through East Berlin after work. An author waits in Moscow to meet the famous prima ballerina Galina Ulanova. A child breathes for the first time, a grandmother dies. In her new volume "Luft zum Leben" (dtv), Helga Schubert has compiled stories from seven decades, many of them published for the first time. Laconic and observant, they document everyday life in the GDR then and now, telling of dictatorship and inner freedom.

In his new novel "Sanditz" (dtv), Lukas Rietzschel, born in 1994 in Upper Lusatia, tells of life in an East German village characterized by political upheaval, family conflicts and social tensions. He portrays an insecure generation searching for stability between the coronavirus pandemic, the war in Ukraine, emigration and a lack of prospects, and experiences how global crises permanently change everyday village life and private relationships.

Two generations of East German experiences, two concise literary voices: Helga Schubert and Lukas Rietzschel talk about how freedom and democracy need to be renegotiated.