On Wednesday, May 7 at 7:30 pm, Katharina Hartwell will be a guest in the Other Salon of the Literaturhaus for a reading in the "Freunde fürs Leben" series. In conversation with Shirin Sojitrawalla (DLF and taz), she will present her novel "Große Lieben".

Game, set and match: Maren and Inga become best friends through the game of tennis. But while one of them moves in the world of the rich and beautiful, the other pursues the unprofitable desire to become a writer. Katharina Hartwell writes sensitively about two unequal friends, about social background and finding one's identity and, in the end, about the difficult balance between self-realization and motherhood.

KATHARINA HARTWELL was born in Cologne in 1984 and has written several novels, including "Das fremde Meer". She has been awarded the MDR Literature Prize and the Würth Literature Prize for her short prose and has also received numerous scholarships.

On Saturday, May 10 from 7 p.m., the second reading party will take place at the Literaturhaus. Organizers are the Literaturhaus and GLYG.

"Reading instead of dancing" is the motto of this special kind of party. Reading enthusiasts meet here to immerse themselves in a good book far away from to-do lists and ringing cell phones and to read together in a quiet yet sociable atmosphere. The idea comes from America. Silent reading parties have been held in numerous cities there for years. Of course, the GLYG team will also provide the right drinks and snacks. Afterwards, anyone who wants to can talk to other visitors about their reading impressions and pick up book tips.

The perfect reading party - for introverts and book nerds! Just pack up your latest read and come along.

FREE ADMISSION. No registration required. Limited number of seats.

Ends at 10 pm. But you can also leave earlier at any time.

On Sunday, May 18 at 2 p.m., the poet and playwright Özlem Özgül Dündar will be a guest at the Literaturhaus as part of a cooperation event between the Literaturhaus and the Hessisches Staatstheater as part of the International May Festival. Beate Tröger (DLF and FAZ) will lead the discussion with her under the motto "Writing between hope and violence".

Özlem Özgül Dündar, whose texts have been awarded the Retzhofer Drama Prize, the Kelag Prize in Klagenfurt and the Brinkmann Scholarship, among others, contrasts tenderness and violence in her texts. Dündar writes poetry, dramatic texts and essays, works as a translator and performer and is currently writing her debut novel. In this way, she tries to approach the questions that concern her from different directions: How can social reality be narrated away from the politics of the day? How can writing capture right-wing violence, racist exclusion and the reality of migrant life without becoming aestheticizing or naturalistic?

To mark the premiere of her play "an grenzen" at the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden, directed by Susanne Frieling, the Literaturhaus invites Dündar to a workshop reading and artist talk. She will read from various facets of her artistic work, including from "an grenzen", which can be seen in the evening at the Hessisches Staatstheater.

In "an grenzen", Dündar contrasts the materiality of migrant bodies, the brutal concreteness of physical exploitation and right-wing violence with a patiently insistent language, characterized by an almost tender longing to perceive and be perceived and to enable a genuine encounter.