Isabella Straub & Anna Weidenholzer - Weidenholzer: Here my potato heart thrives

On this evening, Isabella Straub and Anna Weidenholzer will read from their works, which have been celebrated by the press for their witty, humorous, and poetic narratives.

Cast:
Isabella Straub — Recitation
Anna Weidenholzer — Recitation

Isabella Straub
Born in Vienna, studied German Studies and Philosophy. Many years as a journalist, then a copywriter. Author since 2013. Lecturer in creative writing. Hobby (is that still a term?): contemporary art. Her novels "Südbalkon," "Das Fest des Windrads," and "Wer hier schlief" were published by Blumenbar/Aufbau Berlin. "Nullzone" will be published in 2025 by Elster & Salis Vienna.

Awards and honors: Walter Serner Prize, Debut Prize of the Erfurt Autumn Reading, German Short Story Prize, FM4 Wortlaut, Residency Scholarship at the Mare Artist House of the Roger Willemsen Foundation in Wentorf, Erfurt and Hamburg City Writer. Shortlists: Alfred Döblin Prize, Wortmeldungen Literature Prize, Franz Tumler Prize, Wartholz Literature Prize, Bremen Literature Prize, MDR Literature Prize… Several annual scholarships from the German Literature Fund, LiterarMechana, the State of Carinthia, and the Austrian Federal Ministry for Arts/Culture.

Nullzone
Everything is upside down in the 22 floors of the Kratzer. The crooked high-rise building with social housing in a Vienna urban development area is set to make way for a futuristic luxury real estate project – and this allows for completely different life concepts to collide. A novel that revolves around the question: How do we want to live together in the future?

Anna Weidenholzer
Anna Weidenholzer, born in 1984 in Linz, lives in Vienna. Her first novel, "Der Winter tut den Fischen gut," was nominated for the Leipzig Book Fair Prize. In 2013, she received the Reinhard Priessnitz Prize. Her novel "Weshalb die Herren Seesterne tragen" was nominated for the German Book Prize in 2016. In 2017, she received the Outstanding Artist Award for Literature from the Republic of Austria.

Here beats my potato heart
Like in a panoramic picture, as in the planned detailed replica of the town center, they stand lined up: the neighbor in his work coat, the flatlander who asks for room number six every October 21st, Isabelle, who skins the rabbits, Cervicek, Marianne, Mr. Adam, and all the lonely ones who have somehow blended into the landscape with their bright multifunction jackets. They stand there in winter, when the bears rest, in spring, when winter is leafed over, in summer with little clothing, and in autumn, when the sun is low, like figures in a hidden object picture: scattered, seemingly unconnected, like suns of their own world – and yet united in the greater whole.

With masterfully placed strokes, Anna Weidenholzer depicts an illustrious society, whose certainties of everyday life are gradually slipping away, and which begins to settle into the small absurd moments full of wit and poetry.