Royal opening of Norwegian-German festival

Crown Princess Mette-Marit is present at the opening of "The German-Norwegian Literature Festival.Crown Princess Mette-Marit is present at the opening of "The German-Norwegian Literature Festival.Photo: Vidar Ruud / NTB scanpix

Crown Princess Mette-Marit met a number of writers from Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Norway when she participated in the opening of the German-Norwegian literature festival.

Around 100 translators, academics, and journalists also participated. The three-day festival opened on Friday and is being held at Litteraturhuset in Oslo.

The festival offers talks, lectures, debates, German lessons, a poetry evening, exhibitions, and performances. Never before have so many German-language writers visited Norway at the same time say the organisers.

Babylon Berlin

Among other things, the festival invites visitors to meet Volker Kutscher, the man behind the books on which the popular television series, Babylon Berlin is built.

The subtitle of the festival is “On the way to Frankfurt”, since the German metropolis is hosting the world’s largest book fair in October.

A record number of Norwegian books, over 250 titles, will be published in German this year according to the Royal House. An ordinary year is also high, with between 30 and 40 published releases. At the same time, only ten to twelve titles are translated from German to Norwegian. The festival wishes to do something about this, and many Norwegian writers have set out to promote their German-speaking colleagues.

Bokbane

Earlier on Friday, Crown Princess Mette-Marit told VG newspaper that this year she will replace “Literaturtog” with “Bokbane”. This will be a literary journey by subway through Oslo on the usual route from Kolsås in the west to Stovner in the east on 8 and 9 May.

Along the way, there will be stops for meetings with writers at local libraries at Bekkestua, Røa, Majorstuen, Tøyen, Furuset, and Stovner.

Previously, the Crown Princess herself has conducted most of the conversations with the authors, but due to her health condition with lung fibrosis, Silje Nordnes from P3 news has been brought in to do this, according to VG newspaper.

© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today

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