Levin Westermann and Julia Toggenburger
Photo: Bettina Wohlfender
Levin Westermann, born in Meerbusch in 1980, studied at Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main and Bern University of the Arts. He published his poetry debut, ‘unbekannt verzogen’, in 2012, followed by the poetry collections ‘3511 Zwetajewa’ (2017), ‘bezüglich der schatten’ (2019), ‘farbe komma dunkel’ (2021) and the essay collection ‘Ovibos moschatus’ (2020). Various prizes and scholarships, including Writer in Residence Deutsches Haus New York University 2019, Clemens Brentano Prize 2020 and Swiss Literature Prize 2021. The author has lived as a freelance writer in Biel/Bienne for many years.
Photo: Anja Edelmann
Julia Toggenburger (*1991) grew up in Winterthur and studied literary writing at the Swiss Literature Institute in Biel/Bienne from 2018 to 2021. She is on the road in the Swiss cultural forest with various bands, as a DJ, radio producer, performer and organiser. She writes poetry, experimental prose and texts for the stage; her first volume of poetry will be published by Mäd Book (Basel) in autumn 2022. A reading tour with music will follow in winter 2022/23.
Project
down the river
i can’t write about longing without it hurting
Where does the longing go. What is the nature of the land through which it passes and where does it originate? Is home a place; what is called home; what lies in front of your eyes and behind them, in the self, in the you, in the in-between, in the landscape, in nature.
‘fluss hinab’ transforms the elusive into language, wants to find words and redraw images. Travelling through people’s lives, through the country and capturing what can be written down. Poetry forms the basis but also opens up space for prose.
In the mentoring session, we will discuss the text as it is added and find a coherent form for it.
Extract from a final thesis
