NATUR und die Versuche, ihr mit Sprache beizukommen (“NATURE and the attempts of its linguistic comprehension”) – in her essay, the award-winning author Barbara Frischmuth not only pleads for a greater attentiveness regarding our life on this planet but looks beyond our Western categories to historical examples of coexistence that prove that nature and culture are inherently linked, that one cannot be understood without the other. In doing so, she references Schiefern (“Slates”), a poetry collection of this year’s recipient of the Kleist Prize, Esther Kinsky, whose work has long been concerned with how the deepest layers of this planet can help us to properly face the present.
