The poesiefestival berlin — finally in front of a live audience once again! It has been sorely missed during the pandemic, by all of us. Poetry in particular thrives on being read aloud to attentive listeners. So it’s all the more rewarding that we will have the chance to hear “all that poetry” in a host of languages for an entire week. With poets from all corners of the world, from Belarus to Canada and from Kenya to Slovenia, Weltklang will inspire and engage the audience – both with the soothing, melodious words of the poetry and with the hortatory and powerful voices that aim to unsettle us. One of these voices will be Halyna Kruk from Ukraine, who will read poems about the war in her home country, which she has written especially for Weltklang.
I would like to thank Thomas Wohlfahrt and his team for organising and hosting this festival so that poetry can once again be showcased where it has the greatest impact – on the stage. In this spirit, I hope that all attendees enjoy many impactful encounters with poetry at the festival.
Claudia Roth MdB
Staatsministerin für Kultur und Medien