News

On the occasion of Luxembourg’s presence at the upcoming Leipzig Book Fair, we present the latest publications of Luxembourgish literature in German as well as the novels of the authors reading at the Leipzig Book Fair(*).

* Tomas Bjørnstad, Von der schönen Erde, nominated for the Servais prize 2023
Éditions Guy Binsfeld, 2022, Fiction, German

In Von der schönen Erde (Éditions Guy Binsfeld, 2022), which is already the third work in an entire series of books, the Norwegian-Luxembourgian author Tomas Bjørnstad (heteronym of the well-known Luxembourgian author Nico Helminger) revives the literary avant-garde in the style of Jorge Luis Borges or Julio Cortázar. The backdrop is a town that threatens to develop into a smart city with rapid strides, leaving the people who live in it disoriented. The author creates a game in which worlds and identities merge.

* Samuel Hamen, Wie die Fliegen
Diaphanes, 14. April 2023, Fiction, German

Sent by the Academy, a security agency whose agents pursue saboteurs or root out resistance cells in the districts, a detective travels to a remote town to find the missing teenager Saul. Here, an unbearable hot wind blows daily, and the more the inhabitants, an isolated institute and the scenic surroundings come into view, the more the impression intensifies that everything is fine here – and at the same time nothing is above board. The “decimation”, in which almost all the animals disappeared in one day, and the proceedings at the institute remain unfathomable for the time being. The idyll here seems only a play of desolation, reality only a plaything of power. Soon, Samuel Hamen’s debut novel is no longer just about local unrest or a youth struggling to find a good future, but about much more, about digital ways of life, about ecological grief, ultimately about how we can live in a world that is irretrievably lost to us.

Nathalie Jacoby & Ludivine Jehin (Hg.), Imaginer Servais – Preisgekrönte Literatur erleben
CNL, April 2023, Exhibtion catalogue, German & French

After the successful exhibition Imaginer Servais, the CNL in collaboration with photographer Véronique Kolber (Luxembourg) and sound designers Martin Engler (Berlin), Paul Ford (London) and Luka Tonar (Luxembourg) invite you to (re)visit the exhibition on paper!

Ludivine Jehin & Daniela Lieb (Hg.), Fundstücke – Trouvailles 5
CNL, 2022, Anthology, German & French

After a two-year hiatus, Fundstücke presents itself in a new guise and format, but remains true to the CNL’s dual vocation as an archive and a research institution: enjoy the work and research questions surrounding the archival object and document, as well as various contributions in the field of literary and cultural studies! Discover also the other volumes of the series!

* Claire Schmartz, BUG. 010000100101010101000111
Hydre Editions, 2022, Fiction, German

The professor and top researcher is working on her latest project, the intelligent robot BUD. She works tirelessly on it because she wants the robot to be perfect. For testing purposes, she moves the prototype into a new flat. But something is wrong with the algorithms, because BUD makes inexplicable mistakes. There is a bug.

* Maxime Weber, Das Gangrän
Kremart Edition, 2021, Fiction, German

In various places around the world, a blue, shimmering, root-like web appears that causes all organic life to decay immediately. During the train journey from Paris to Luxembourg, the newly graduated Jeanne reads about this strange natural phenomenon on the Internet, which is spreading rapidly and is said to have already claimed several lives. The life-destroying phenomenon becomes the all-determining factor in the formerly tranquil town of Pardange in Luxembourg.