Maxi Obexer

Maxi Obexer, participant in the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize 2017, in front of the ORF Theater.

Maxi (Margareth) Obexer (* 1970 in Brixen ) is a German-Italian writer from South Tyrol who lives in Berlin . She is a freelance writer of plays , novels , radio plays , essays and short stories .

Life

Maxi Obexer studied comparative literature , philosophy and theater studies in Vienna and Berlin . During her studies she received awards for her plays and radio plays. She has received scholarships from the Literary Colloquium in Berlin, the Akademie der Künste and the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart . Obexer was visiting professor in the USA ( Dartmouth College , Georgetown University , University of New Mexico) and at the Berlin University of the Arts . She teaches regularly at the Leipzig Literature Institute . In 2014 she founded the New Institute for Dramatic Writing, Nids, with Sasha Marianna Salzmann . She is a member of PEN International.

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Maxi Obexer's work includes plays, novels, radio plays, short stories and essays. The author has made a name for herself with her political writing. Central are topics such as love in today's times, women and Europe and how it deals with emigration and immigration. The topic of flight , which she deals with both in her pieces and in artistic projects with refugees, also comes into play. Her special commitment is to the drama and its political significance. This is reflected in many texts and lectures, as well as in the numerous workshops that she runs.

theatre

The now more than twenty plays have been performed in the entire German-speaking theater area ( Basel , Berlin , Salzburg , Innsbruck , Dresden , Potsdam and others); Several of her pieces have been translated and have been seen in other European countries ( Poland , Hungary , France, etc.) as well as in the USA ( New York , Chicago , Washington, etc.). Due to their Italian origins with German mother tongue, their works often have the function of European messenger reports.

After jaundice , her first play, she achieved her first success with Die Liebenden . The play could be seen on numerous stages and was also produced as a radio play by WDR , which received two awards at the International Radio Play Conference in Rust.

The ghost ship (2007) deals with a refugee disaster in the Mediterranean region . “A strong theme, a solid, political, versatile, sometimes very funny piece,” writes Lena Schneider (night review), for Katrin Bettina Müller (TAZ) the text of the piece “goes far beyond moral indignation: it tells of the many absurdities and contortions of thought brought about by settling in with unhappiness. "

Glacier picks up the game with myths , which was already important for The Ghost Ship .

Lotzer is also a piece about freedom . A revolution from 2009. It tells the story of an almost forgotten revolutionary and his struggle for freedom during the 1525 peasant movement.

In 2016 there followed the world premiere of Illegale Helfer , which arose out of interviews with people who helped illegal immigrants and refugees and who, in some cases, became criminal. The play and the radio play of the same name received worldwide attention, and staged readings were shown in Washington DC, New York, Chicago, Paris, Prague, Mannheim, Lübeck and Vienna, among others. In him, according to Irene Bazinger in the FAZ, Obexer succeeded in “drawing the gaze back from the masses to the individuals, from humanity to human beings”. Illegale Helfer received the Eurodrama Prize in 2015, and the radio play was awarded the Robert Geisendörfer Prize .

Going and staying is a play about what stays and still goes with when people leave their countries. The multilingual play is based on the experiences of those involved and was awarded the Potsdam Theater Prize 2017.

2018 was premiered in the Staatstheater Mannheim when we love . The radio play of the same name was first broadcast on WDR in spring 2020. The text deals with "the most beautiful and trickiest story in the world: that of love" and tells of love in all its facets.

Lost fighters. The story of the RAF terrorists Wolfgang Grams and Birgit Hogefeld tells the story of the end of the Red Army faction . Obexer's "thoroughly researched text supplemented with original documents" (Johannes Breckner, Main-Spitze) was premiered in Wiesbaden in 2019.

Obexer's pieces have been translated into various languages, including a. into Hungarian and English .

Novels

Obexer's debut novel When dangerous dogs laugh ( Folio Verlag , 2011) tells the story of 20-year-old Helen, who makes her way to Europe from Nigeria. The escape becomes a nightmare. Obexer "with her protagonist Helen gives countless refugee women a face", says Radio Bremen, the Süddeutsche Zeitung finds the novel "unobtrusively gripping".

In the publishing firm in 2017 appeared in Europe's longest summer . The autobiographical novel, with which Obexer was nominated for the Bachmann Prize, tells of how the author from South Tyrol travels to Berlin, where she lives, to finally get her German passport. In doing so, she realizes: She is also a migrant. A book that raises “fundamental questions about the crisis of European identity” is a “successful, relevant text whose unique selling point is tarnished by Obexer's strongly generalizing and excessively moralizing position on European refugee policy” (Florian Kölsch, FAZ).

Others

Obexer also writes opera libretti and performances .

With the sound installation Defending Europe (together with Hannes Hölzl), Obexer was represented at the European art exhibition Manifesta07 . It is a collection of embellished letters that an African migrant writes to her parents. Defending Europe is the basis for the novel When Dangerous Dogs Laugh .

Obexer wrote the commissioned work Planet der Frauen for the Freiburg Theater . According to Missy Magazine, the “Combat Operetta” with music by Bernadette La Hengst is “dynamic, smart, perfectly and gently provocative and partisan from start to finish” (Dorothee Annette Kreuzer). For Bettina Schulte from the Badische Zeitung the piece measures the “ Discussion about the state of female affairs in all their complexity does well ”.

Publications (selection)

• Jaundice , play and radio play, premiere: Berlin 2001
• The Heart of a Bastard , Stories, Athesia 2002
• From head to toe , play, premiere: Osnabrück 2004
• Die Liebenden , play, premiere: Tübingen / Stuttgart 2004
• The twin , play, premiere: Dresden 2006
• The Ghost Ship , play and radio play, WP; Jena 2007
• Glacier , play, premiere: Stuttgart 2008
• Lotzer. A revolution , play, premiere: Memmingen 2009
• When dangerous dogs laugh , Roman, Folio Verlag 2011
• Planet der Frauen , Combat Operetta, WP: Freiburg 2012
• Illegal helpers , play and radio play, WP: Potsdam 2016
• Going and Staying , play, premiere: Potsdam 2017
• Europe's longest summer , novel, Verbrecher Verlag 2017
• If we love , play and radio play, premier: Mannheim 2018
• Lost fighters. From the end of the RAF , play, premiere: Wiesbaden 2019

Radio plays

• 1999 Die Liebenden , directed by Claudia Johanna Leist (WDR)
• 2005 Hidden See , directed by the author (WDR)
• 2006 Das Geisterschiff , directed by Martin Zylka (WDR)
• 2006 Liberté toujours , director: Anouschka Trocker (author's production)
• 2008 FOB - Free on Board , director: Anouschka Trocker (author's production)
• 2011 Gletscher , director: Barbara Plensat (author's production), awarded the Slabbèsz radio play prize in 2011 .
• 2018 Europe's longest summer , director: Gerrit Booms , approx. 30 min., (WDR)

literature

• Friederike Eigler: "Refugee and Migrant Voices On and Off the Documentary Theater Stage: Recent Works by Maxi Obexer", in: The Many Voices of Europe , eds. Gisela Brinker-Gabler, Nicole Shea, Culture & Conflict Volume 15, De Gruyter 2020 .

Web links

• Internet presence of Maxi Obexer
• Publishing house at schaefersphilippen
• New Institute for Dramatic Writing

Individual evidence

1. ^ New Institute for Dramatic Writing. Retrieved April 16, 2020 . 
2. ↑ Portrait of the author. Retrieved April 16, 2020 . 
3. ↑ “What if my state is not human?” The author Maxi Obexer in conversation with Anne Fleig about engagement and dramatic writing. Retrieved April 16, 2020 . 
4. ↑ Lena Schneider: The conscience beats with rubber wings. In: Nachtkritik. December 13, 2007, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
5. ↑ Katrin Bettina Müller: From the curse of the inner perspective. In: TAZ. March 15, 2010, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
6. ↑ Lotzer. Retrieved April 16, 2020 . 
7. ↑ Irene Bazinger: Illegal helpers. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. June 11, 2006, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
8. ↑ Radio play When we love by Maxi Obexer. Retrieved April 16, 2020 . 
9. ↑ Dagmar Fulle: The end of the RAF on the theater stage. A conversation with Maxi Obexer. In: hr info. June 11, 2006, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
10. ↑ Broadcasting House Europe. In: Radio Bremen. June 11, 2006, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
11. ↑ Cornelia Fiedler: Continental drift. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. August 22, 2011, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
12. ↑ Florian Kölsch: I moved out of my home. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. August 9, 2017, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
13. ↑ Dorothee Annette Kreuzer: "We urgently need a regular shuttle" - The combat operetta "Planet der Frauen" at the Freiburg Theater. In: Missy Magazine. March 12, 2012, accessed April 16, 2020 . 
14. ^ Bettina Schulte: Combat operetta "Planet der Frauen" at the Freiburg Theater. In: Badische Zeitung. March 26, 2012, accessed April 16, 2020 .