December 20, 2012

Festival Neue Literatur Announces Prestigious Prize for Promoting German-language Literature The Friedrich Ulfers Prize will be awarded annually to an individual who has demonstrated exemplary work in the promotion of German-language literature in the U.S. NEW YORK - Festival Neue Literatur (FNL), New Yorks preeminent German-language literary festival, will be celebrating its fourth year on February 22 - 24, 2013 across various locations in Brooklyn and Manhattan. This years festival will include a new prize awarded by Deutsches Haus at New York University to a leading publisher, writer, critic, translator or scholar who has championed the advancement of German-language literature in the United States. At a time when fiction from Austria, Germany and Switzerland is increasingly reaching American audiences, we want to honor those who have dedicated themselves to providing access to these often hidden treasures. Festival Neue Literatur has itself over the past years become a symbol for these efforts and is therefore an ideal platform to inaugurate the Friedrich Ulfers Prize. Thanks to the generosity of Professor Friedrich Ulfers, a life-long promoter of German literature and thought, this prize will give testimony to the rising importance of German-language literature in America, said Martin Rauchbauer, Director of Deutsches Haus at New York University. The first recipient of the newly established Friedrich Ulfers Prize of Deutsches Haus at NYU will be announced and awarded during the opening ceremony of this years FNL on February 21 at the Goethe Institut New York. A jury composed of representatives of FNLs participating institutions and organizations will select the inaugural winner. The prize winner will receive $ 5,000, donated by Professor Ulfers, a renowned NYU scholar and former director of Deutsches Haus at NYU. It is my fervent hope that this prize will make a contribution to the efforts of many dedicated and passionate people in the publishing industry, the media and academia to make German-language literature accessible to an American audience by giving it a spotlight it so richly deserves, said Professor Ulfers. About Festival Neue Literatur Festival Neue Literatur (FNL) is New Yorks first and only annual German-language literary festival, established in 2009 as a collaborative project of New Yorks leading German-language cultural institutions: the Austrian Cultural Forum, Deutsches Haus at Columbia University, Deutsches Haus at NYU, the German Book Office, the German Consulate, the Goethe-Institut NY, Pro Helvetia and the Swiss Consulate. Each year FNL brings six of the best up-and-coming German-language authors from Austria, Germany and Switzerland to NYC. For New York literary fans it is a rare opportunity to tap into the flourishing German-language literary landscape. Over the festival weekend, featured authors engage in a series of panels and readings with American guest authors. Past American authors include: Francisco Goldman, Chris Adrian, Rivka Galchen and Francine Prose. Festival Neue Literatur 2013 will feature authors Clemens Setz and Cornelia Travnicek of Austria, Leif Randt and Silke Scheuermann of Germany and Tim Krohn and Ulrike Ulrich of Switzerland, along with American authors Joshua Cohen and Joshua Ferris. FNL 2013 will proceed under the curatorial direction of Susan Bernofsky and Claudia Steinberg.

Learn more about the festival at www.festivalneueliteratur.org. Visit FNL on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/FestivalNeueLiteratur and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/FestNeueLit FNL Media Contact: Brittany Hazelwood festivalneueliteratur@gmail.com 502 762 3455

Friedrich Ulfers is Associate Professor of German at New York University, in the past also serving as Assistant Dean of the College of Arts and Science, the German Departments Director of Undergraduate Studies, Director of the NYU in Berlin Summer and Director of Deutsches Haus at NYU. Winner of NYU's Distinguished Teaching Medal and Great Teacher Award, and twice winner of the College of Arts and Science's Golden Dozen Award for Excellence in Teaching, he has taught not only in the German Department but also in NYU's interdisciplinary programs, offering courses that engage a range of interests, including literary theory, continental philosophy, and the relationships between science, literature, and philosophy. From 1999 to 2009 Professor Ulfers was also affiliated with the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland. He served there as professor of Philosophy, teaching an intensive Summer Seminar on Nietzsche and 20th/21st-Century Thought and giving a variety of lectures. From 2006 - 2009 he was Dean of the Media and Communications Division of the School, and in 2009 he was appointed Professor Emeritus. He is Senator of and serves as Secretary of the American Council for the Schools Media and Communications Division.