10 a.m. | Kulturhaus Lÿz
Gideon Samson
Shooting Stars Summer
A holiday novel about friendship and the end of childhood for people from the age of 11. Presentation for schools

12-year-old Jakob is spending the summer with his father on a Greek island where he meets Michális with the contagious laugh. The boys swim and snorkel together in the sea, climb trees, ride donkeys, or simply sit in the sun. The days are just passing by. It’s a wonderful summer, the best ever, Micha thinks. Soon, the two of them are best friends. And when cheerful Puck joins them, things just get better. The three of them eat ice-cream, laugh, dance at the village festival, watch the stars, tell each other shooting stars secrets, and are happy. If only it could always stay like this! A captivating summer story about the lightness of being, friendship, the end of childhood, and the fragility of good luck.

Gideon Samson published his first book at the age of 22. He is the youngest author ever to be awarded the Dutch literature award Silver Stylus. For Shooting Stars Summer he was awarded the LUCHS Prize of the weekly Die Zeit and Radio Bremen. In 2018 Gideon Samson was nominated for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, the richest award in children’s and youth literature in the world.

At the reading in the Lÿz the Dutchman will be supported by his German translator Rolf Erdorf.

Approx.. 60 mins. Admission: 3.00 € / Accompanying persons free / Schools please register under 0271 / 333-2447

6 p.m. | hackermann – küche und bar
Michel Birbæk
The Most Beautiful Girl in The World

Since Leo Palmer lost the love of his life he avoids steady relationships – until he meets Mona. She is married, he is a womanizer, but fate brings them together for one night. The deal: no phone numbers, no reunion. But the night turns out just too good. When Leo and Mona meet up again, he learns in the middle of their date that his great musical idol Prince has just died. Shocked, Leo seeks comfort from old friends – and also from his ex-wife – and he realizes that he has to confront the ghosts of his past in order to have a future with Mona. …

Michael Birbæk, born in Copenhagen in 1962, was on the road as a singer in a rock band for 15 years. He then worked as a columnist for several women’s magazines (Cosmopolitan) and as a screenwriter. His five novels so far have convinced critics as well as a large fan base. When his idol Prince died in 2016, he started writing a novel to channel his feelings. It turned out as The Most Beautiful Girl in The World, Birbæk’s personal tribute to the two most wonderful things in the world – love and music.

Admission: 5,- €

Birbæk’s personal top 10 songs of all times:
1. Sometimes It Snows In April, Prince
2. Gran Torino, Jamie Cullum
3. All Good Things In Life, Sammy Davis jr.
4. River High – River Low, Les McCann
5. Can’t Love U Anymore (Hotelzimmerversion), Prince
6. I Kan Ikke Slå Os Ihjel, Det Internationale Sigøjner Kompagni
7. Still Got The Blues, Gary Moore
8. Bis Ans Ende Der Welt, Udo Lindenberg
9. Waltzing Matilda, Tom Waits
10. Man In The Mirror, Michael Jackson

8 p.m. | Kulturhaus Lÿz
Christian Brückner
reads from the Odyssee by Homer

It is the oldest homecomer story of mankind, the Odyssey. The term has long become an allegory for an arduous journey. Not being able to return home when returning home is the most burning desire – a nightmare of tragic topicality. Written over 2000 years ago the Greek heroic epic belongs to the most influential works of western literature. After Odysseus battled for Troy, Poseidon’s curse prevents him from returning to Ithaca. His odyssey lasts ten years. Ten years full of detours, menaces, and temptations. Again and again he is stopped, obstacles get in his way, tests have to be passed. But Odysseus never loses sight of his destination: home.

The cool and at the same time warm sound of Christian Brückner’s voice has a great presence and has over the decades become legendary through radio, readings and audio-books. The voice-over of Robert de Niro and Robert Redford thrilled the audience at the KulturPur concert PhilharMOVIE with the Philharmonie Südwestfalen in 2009. His brilliant art of declamation now carries the audience away onto the adventurous wanderings of Odysseus. The French writer George Duhamel once recommended that “a cultivated European should re-read Homer’s epics every ten years.” Of course, it’s even nicer to have Christian Brückner read them to you. Brückner meets the Odyssey, two legends on one stage.

VVK: 18,- € / AK: 20,- € / erm.: 16,- € / (freie Platzwahl) / 585 (Ehrenamt, Schüler & Studenten)

Chris Kraus, a failed artist who relentlessly approaches the age of 40, meets through her husband the academic cowboy Dick. Dick becomes her obsession. Overwhelmed by her feelings she starts writing a story about their first meeting, then she writes letters which she doesn’t send, and also Sylvère, her husband, becomes a part of this concept-threesome. At times they both write to Dick together, at times individually, but whereas Sylvère at some stage loses interest, Chris gets entangled deeper and deeper in the abyss of her own desires.

In her novel, which was adapted into an Amazon TV series, Chris Kraus removes the lines between fiction, essay and diary and thus created a completely new genre. I Love Dick is regarded as the last great feminist novel of the 20^th century and the first great love story of the 21^st century.

In the extraordinary atmosphere of the Dunkelcafé actor Armin Nufer brings to bear the erotic potential of I Love Dick particularly well. In complete darkness the audio-book reader and voice-over takes his audience into the obsessive world of Chris Kraus  and lets them feel the tingly eroticism of her novel. A literary-sensuous evening in a not everyday setting.

Admission: 8.- €