European Literature Night with A.L. Kennedy
Where have our European writers gone?
In spite of all that has been going on over the course of this last year, writers still write, publishers still publish, and translators still translate. And audiences still get to hear about this! Thankfully festivals this year are full of translated fiction from countries all over Europe, and the season kicks off with a new "European Writers' Tour" programme run by EUNIC London and coordinated by the Camoes Institute in partnership with the Royal Society of Literature and the British Library. It is supported by The European Commission Representation in the UK and EUNIC Global, with additional support by the Czech Centre, the Goethe-Institut, Flanders House, the Italian Cultural Institute and the Institut Francais.
The first event will be on May 10th at 7pm with A.L. Kennedy, Clemens Meyer and Francesca Melandri. No French writer but plenty more further on in the year within the same programme, which will be bringing Alexis Jenni to Hay! (after his first appearance at our brand new Beyond Words!)
Find out more about the event here, Don't forget to follow EUNIC London on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram!
A L Kennedy was born in Dundee in 1965. She is the author of 17 books: six literary novels, one science fiction novel, seven short story collections and three works of non-fiction, including Serious Sweet, Day and The Blue Book. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and was twice included in the Granta Best of Young British Novelists list. Her prose is published in a number of languages. She has won awards including the 2007 Costa Book Award and the Austrian State Prize for International Literature. She is also a dramatist for the stage, radio, TV and film. She is an essayist and regularly reads her work on BBC radio. She occasionally writes and performs one-person shows. She writes for a number of UK and overseas publications and for The Guardian Online.
Clemens Meyer was born in Halle in 1977 and lives in Leipzig. His debut novel, Als wir träumten (As We Were Dreaming) appeared in 2006 and was followed by Die Nacht, die Lichter (All The Lights) (2008), Gewalten. Ein Tagebuch (Acts of Violence) (2010), and his 2013 novel Im Stein (In The Rock). Clemens Meyer has been awarded numerous literary prizes for his work, including the 2008 Leipzig Book Fair Prize. Im Stein was shortlisted for the 2013 Deutschen Buchpreis and awarded the Bremen Literaturpreis. Als wir träumten (As We Were Dreaming) was adapted for film in 2015 by Andreas Dresen and featured at the Berlinale film festival.
Francesca Melandri was born in Rome in 1964. She started writing very young, working first as a screenwriter, and has worked on films and television series, as well as a number of prize winning documentaries. In 2010 she published her first novel, Eva dorme (Eva Sleeps), set in the border regions of Northern Italy and Austria, a sweeping story about family, forgiveness, conflict and the search for truth. The novel, which won several literary prizes in 2010 and 2011, has been translated in German, Dutch, French and English. Her second novel, Più alto del mare, was published in 2012 and it has also won several literary prizes.
Arifa Akbar is a journalist, literary critic and columnist. She is also the curator of ‘M-Fest’, a Muslim festival of books and ideas launching at King’s Place, London, in September 2017. She is the former literary editor of The Independent, where she worked from 2001 until 2016 as a reporter and arts correspondent before joining the books desk. Arifa has judged the Orwell Prize 2013, the Fiction Uncovered Prize 2014 and the British Bookseller Industry Award 2016, and she was the lead judge for Aesthetica Magazine’s short story competition for the third year in 2016. In addition, Arifa has chaired author interviews at the London Literature Festival, Bath Literature Festival, Bradford Literature Festival, Foyles and Asia House, among others. She is on the advisory committee for EnglishPEN’s writing in translation programme, and is a regular newspaper reviewer on Sky News. She also reviews books for the FT.
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