Tristan Marquardt & Andreas Töpfer / Heike Geißler / Radka Denemarková - 40. Freiburger Literaturgespräch: Drei Lesungen mit Gespräch
Tristan Marquardt & Andreas Töpfer: catalog of catalogs
Moderation: Martin Bruch
Catalogs about friendship and love, emptiness, light and sleep, about astonishing sayings and forms of lies, as well as lists of words that are hardly used in everyday life, but are quite practical. In this congenial artist book, words by Tristan Marquardt and drawings by Andreas Töpfer enter into a poetic dialogue – in search of a new language to describe the world. The “catalog of catalogs” (kookbooks, 2026) presents an inspiringly clever, witty, and pointed order of feelings, things, and phenomena.
The two word and image artists have been connected since Tristan Marquardt's poetry volumes “it doesn't amortize” (2013) and “scrolling in the deep sea” (2018), both published by kookbooks, which the freelance graphic designer, illustrator, and draftsman Andreas Töpfer co-founded with Daniela Seel in 2003. During the literary discussion, Töpfer will draw live during Marquardt's reading.
Heike Geißler: Michaela Kohlhaas
Moderation: Annette Pehnt
In her daring reinterpretation (Suhrkamp, 2026), Heike Geißler brings Heinrich von Kleist's vengeful horse dealer Michael Kohlhaas from the 16th century into the present and transforms him into the defiant cemetery administrator Michaela.
Fueled by experienced arbitrariness and powerlessness, she becomes rebellious and embarks on a ruthless campaign of revenge against all the greedy and merciless. Where Michael Kohlhaas murders and plunders, she lays her city to waste with the sheer power of her words and thoughts: intensification, exaggeration, sabotage, and show are her weapons. As a citizen who pays no heed to rules or authority, she is declared insane. But as soon as she ignites resistance, it spreads uncontrollably. Her goal is nothing less than a new composition of the world. “Heike Geißler writes the most rapid, vibrant resistance prose in contemporary German literature,” judges the FAZ. She talks about her tender, stinking, cursing, loving heroine with her fellow writer Annette Pehnt.
Radka Denemarková: “Chocolate Blood”
Moderation: Thomas Geiger
“A life-changing time travel” (SZ), “an ultimate accelerant for the mind” (Die Presse), “a magic mirror” (Olga Tokarczuk): In “Chocolate Blood” (Hoffmann und Campe, 2026, translated by Eva Profousová), the award-winning Czech author Radka Denemarková takes us to the small writing room of author Božena Němcová, who writes a patriotic fairy tale with heavy hands, a message in which she herself does not believe. George Sand, her French contemporary, can oppose the constraints of conventions and writes novels with a light touch. On the other side of the Atlantic, J.D. Rockefeller, the first billionaire in history, builds his empire on a viscous brown raw material.
In her new masterpiece, Radka Denemarková narrates the story of the 19th century and its protagonists: globally connected, highly relevant, brilliant. Coming from the Frankfurt Book Fair, which honors the Czech Republic as the guest country this year, the author, playwright, essayist, and translator also has her second novel “Goblin,” which is being published in German this year, in tow.
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Photos: Tristan Marquardt © Dirk Skiba, Andreas Töpfer © private, Heike Geißler © Heike Steinweg, Radka Denemarková © Karel Cudlín
Sponsors: Cultural Office of the City of Freiburg, Ministry of Science, Research, and Arts Baden-Württemberg, Sparkasse Freiburg-Northern Breisgau, Guzzoni-Federer Foundation, Deutsche Pfandbriefbank
Cooperation Partners: Theater im Marienbad, Bookstore jos fritz
Cultural Partners: SWR Kultur
Date: 7.11.2026, 3–6 PM
Location: Literaturhaus Freiburg, Bertoldstraße 17
Admission: 11/7 Euro
Literary discussion
Literaturhaus
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
