Breaking the Canon
Vier Jahrzehnte verpasste Anerkennung – zur Lyrik Semra Ertans. Von Cana Bilir-Meier und Zühal Bilir-Meier.
Past dates
6/10/21
6:00 PM
Four Decades Of Missed Recognition – On The Poetry Of Semra Ertan. By Cana Bilir-meier And ZÜhal Bilir-meier.
18:00 / 40 min.
The worker and poet Semra Ertan had already tried to get her poetry published and anchored in the German literary landscape during her lifetime. She made efforts to have readings, distributed her poems to other people, some of her texts were part of an anthology on »migrant literature«. Semra Ertan even joined the writers' association shortly before her death in order to network. The left-wing paper Spökenkieker had printed one of her poems shortly after her early death at the age of 25. And yet: visibility and recognition were a long way off. A good forty years later, we hold the poetry collection »Mein Name ist Ausländer | Benim Adım Yabancı« in our hands, thanks to the relentless work of Semra Ertan's sister, Zühal Bilir-Meier, and her niece, Cana Bilir-Meier. For almost ten years, they too have wrestled with publishers and fought for a serious and careful literary examination of Semra Ertan's work. But what does the lost time mean for the reception of her poetry? How many would have needed her poems twenty years ago? What violence lies in the sole marking as »migrant poetry«, the white social view of literature, and the missed canonisation over four decades?
Moderation: Alina Buchberger
• Prerecorded, screening on Kampnagel's Vimeo channel
• In spoken German
