Clara Umbach und Ann Esswein

The joint reading by Clara Umbach and Ann Esswein opens up a space in which literary narratives about love, vulnerability and self-determination meet and illuminate each other. Umbach brings with her "Pizza Orlando" a novel that reflects closeness and distance in a dialogical web of chat messages and narrative passages. The relationship between Clara and Nina unfolds against the backdrop of a severe neurodegenerative disease, giving everyday news an existential undertone. Esswein's "Years without Language" takes us into a completely different, yet related world of experience: Natascha's story revolves around the loss of language after an assault, the fractures of growing up and the fumbling attempts to make injured memories accessible again. The combination of the two texts creates an evening that does not show fragile life plans in isolation, but as an expression of inner struggles, social conditions and faint hopes. The event at Agnes Buchhandlung invites you to listen intently and experience the poetic yet unsparing moments of both novels, raising questions about agency, care and the path back to oneself.

Attention: Only in German