So, I did make it to the castle party! But I forgot my camera! Otherwise, and if I were already an expert blogger, I could have shown you the proof. Now you have to take my word for it.
It’s a fascinating concept, that Ingeborg Bachmann literary festival and I don’t think there is anything like it here in the UK. Quite surprising actually since it’s got all the right ingredients. It’s basically an abridged version of The Apprentice plus Britten Got Talent for literature. Fourteen authors, known and less known, renowned and less renowned, each read for half an hour an unpublished text. After each reading a panel of seven judges, made up of literary critics, writers and academics, voice their opinion in an half an hour discussion. At the end the best text is chosen and awarded the Ingeborg Bachmann prize. All of this is televised.
Its a show for the judges really. The discussions are often more interesting than the texts, because over the course of the three days you get to know the characters of the judges and can predict in advance who will say what to which text. You will have your favorite judge and the one who you feel has absolutely no clue. They turn into fixed characters in your head and cannot escape their roles. This year was no exception until one text came along that changed it all. The text was by an unknown poet who ventured for the first time into prose. And … it was dull. Static and void of any internal movement. At best, these eleven pages could have been reduced to a beautiful poem. But then the big surprise came: almost all judges, including my favorite, thought it was a remarkable text. I frantically skip read again the pages on my knees, wondering if I missed something unbelievably important. I hadn’t. Only one judge had real issues with the text - my least favorite with whom I up to then had mostly disagreed. Suddenly we were allies.
It took a while to piece together the jigsaw puzzle. The text had been recommended by the leading critic who in turn was pointed in the direction of the text by the most imminent of all German agents. In addition the leading critic is best mate with one of the leading Germophone publishers. So there were a lot of important people to reassure that their opinion was sound. There you go, that’s how literature is made.
Anyway, let me not over-dramatize. Not all is lost in the German speaking literary scene. This text did not win the Bachmann Preis 2009. Indeed the text that won has my stamp of approval ( no! I am not best mate with either the author, or the publisher or the agent). Jens Petersen’s “Till Death May Us” which won with five panel voices against two, was an haunting extract from the author’s soon to be published novel about euthanasia and the attempted suicide in a relationship. Written in sparse language it sent shivers down my spine. (You can read an English translation of the text here.)
By the way: Just in case Simon Cowall will ever read this blog and create a Brit Lit TV competition - please Simon, don’t forget to mention Peirene and her books!
enough people who seemed to share the same belief system: “Oh, no, I don’t network. Awful.” “Going to parties just to network. How ghastly.” I had to become a mature woman to realize that it is often a lie, not a bad one, just a white one, and especially people who insist they don’t network all network like hell and that’s one of the pillars of their success.
reveal a celebrity status or a secret tycoon. What guaranties will you have that this business is indeed a serious enterprise run by a capable person? None. I could be deluded, I could be a pretender, I could be a woman without substance. I could be a woman who sits by the poolside painting her nails, dreaming her dreams but lacking focus, drive and abilities.