The Shortlist of the Year 2017

“Urgent, acute, almost live: in this gesture the books shortlisted this year negotiate vastly diverging modes of existence, heterogeneous worlds and issues that have to be addressed without delay. Among them are war, encounters within the postcolonial, bodies in authoritarian regimes, the void left behind by totalitarianism, obvious and subtle metamorphoses. The formal scope is wide: prose miniatures, stories, a fictionalized biography and novels. What connects the diversity of topics and modes of expression of all shortlisted titles is their literary energy. It creates it’s very own arc of suspense: universal questions arise from the specific viewpoints of the individual texts that reach far beyond their situational anchorage.”
— The Jury

Der Tod backt einen Geburtstagskuchen

by Hamed Abboud│Translated from Arabic by Larissa Bender
In this poetic-political outcry the Syrian writer Hamed Abboud writes about the destructions of the civil war and the devastations of the soul.
Die letzten Tage des Comandante

by Alberto Barrera Tyszka│Translated from Spanish by Matthias Strobel
In a subversive and shrill mode the Venezuelan writer and journalist Alberto Barrera Tyszka raises the question about the essence of demagogic rule and the moral vacuum it leaves behind.
Die Vegetarierin

by Han Kang│Translated from Korean by Ki-Hyang Lee
In three acts the South Korean author Han Kang portrays a woman who no longer wants to eat meat and wants to become a plant – a Kafkaesque drama about a conformist world and its rejection.
Ministerium für öffentliche Erregung

by Amanda Lee Koe│Translated from English by Zoë Beck
Amanda Lee Koes’ short stories offer insights into the cosmos of an ultra-modern Singapore, possible and impossible encounters of witches, art curators, film stars, transsexuals – brief and fast-paced.
Tram 83

by Fiston Mwanza Mujila│Translated from French by Katharina Meyer & Lena Müller
Internationaler Literaturpreis 2017
With a merciless furor the Congolese author Fiston Mwanza Mujila chants, roars, whispers his radical report on modern urban slum life in Africa. Salvation is unlikely.
Mordor kommt und frisst uns auf

by Ziemowit Szczerek│Translated from Polish by Thomas Weiler
In his gonzo travelogue the Polish journalist Ziemowit Szczerek offhandedly sketches the post-Soviet east and his search for the “Slavic soul” in an ecstatic language with punk allures.
July 6, 2017, from 6pm

Celebration of the Shortlist & Award Ceremony

Free admission

The Shortlist of the Year 2017

Der Tod backt einen Geburtstagskuchen

Die letzten Tage des Comandante

Die Vegetarierin

Ministerium für öffentliche Erregung

Tram 83

Mordor kommt und frisst uns auf

Celebration of the Shortlist & Award Ceremony