etc is poetry. Poetry, Poetics, Positions

The poetry boom continues as a plethora of voices and the high quality of contemporary poetry are acclaimed all around us. The past 20 years have been hailed as the “heyday of German poetry”. Poetry festivals are showing record attendance; a several-day congress (“Fokus Lyrik”) began taking stock; classifying studies like those of Christian Metz (Poetisch denken) and new anthologies are appearing. We might conclude that there has never been so much poetry! But how is the book market really doing? And more importantly: What has changed aesthetically in recent decades? What is or can a poem be? What does the “performative change” mean? What role is played by a link to earlier poets or tradition?

Michael Lentz’s lecture on the charged relationship between text and voice will open the event. Poets discuss their poems and poetologies in tandem. Participants include: Steffen Popp, Ulrike Draesner, Monika Rinck, Nico Bleutge, Anja Utler, Aleš Šteger, Fiston Mwanza Mujila, Nora Bossong, Thomas Rosenlöcher, Michael Braun, Daniela Seel, Volker Braun, Kerstin Hensel, Ursula Krechel, Harald Hartung, et al. Angelika Niescier (sax) and Julia Kadel (p) provide musical accompaniment for the Poetry Night on Saturday.

Further event on 26 Oct.