Ulrich Zieger

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Ulrich Zieger during an interview at the Erlanger Poetenfest 2011

Ulrich Zieger (born December 29, 1961 in Döbeln ; † July 23, 2015 in Montpellier ) was a German writer .

life and work

Ulrich Zieger was the son of a craftsman and a teacher. He lived in Waldheim until 1970 and in Magdeburg from 1970 to 1981 , where he trained as a chemographer . In 1981 he went to Berlin . There he worked in a scientific publishing house ; In addition, he was literarily active in the alternative scene in the Prenzlauer Berg district . He worked as a collaborator in various literary underground magazines and with the independent theater group " Zinnober ". In the early 1980s, Zieger met Gert Neumann , whose friendship gave him important artistic impulses.

In 1985 Zieger wrote his first play The Sun is Blue , the motif of which deals with the child murderer Jürgen Bartsch . The play was  discussed in the GDR - by the henschel Schauspiel Verlag and those responsible for the Berliner Ensemble - but it was neither published nor staged.

In 1987 Heiner Müller cast Ulrich Zieger as the speaker for his radio play production of Bertolt Brecht's play Downfall of the Egoist Fatzer , in which Frank Castorf and the band Einstürzende Neubauten , among others, participated.

In the spring of 1989, Zieger left the GDR and went to West Germany. In the years to come, he expanded The Sun is Blue to include the plays The Shift of the Steppe and That Between the Temples ... the Eyes for the trilogy Everlasting Slope . These pieces were initially not staged either and only had their world premiere at the Jena Theater in the mid-1990s. Reinhardt Stumm characterizes Zieger's position in the theater and literary scene at the time: “Sometimes this one was interested, sometimes that one, but it never came of it. He went to the West, there he came from the GDR, that wasn't right either. The lucky ones sit on a chair or bench, the space in between was reserved for him. "

In 1990 Ziegers first volume of poetry was published, Nineteen Sixty-five . For this publication he was awarded the Nicolas Born Prize in 1991 . In his laudation, Uwe Kolbe wrote about the book: “[…] this“ exchange of letters ”, in which“ everyone / poem from childhood / is kept silent ”. I have truly become addicted to this kind of silence. There is a power emanating from him that increases, that becomes more intense and compelling from poem to poem. "

In 1992 Zieger met Wim Wenders , who was working on the sequel to his film Der Himmel über Berlin . Zieger took over the script. The film was released in 1993 under the title In Far Ferne, so nah! in the cinemas.

In the same year took Annegret Hahn Zieger to the Schiller Theater in Berlin to the order of Heiner Müller to stage. When the closure of the Schiller Theater was announced shortly afterwards, the plan was dropped. Instead, Zieger wrote the play Über die Mandelbrot quantity , which premiered as one of the theater's last productions. Zieger remembers the situation in the Schillertheater: “But then everything went down the drain and the members of the house all went on vacation, although they had first said that we would all stay here and sleep and eat here. […] In the end, they were all just outside people; Unemployed, enthusiasts and beginners. [...] I directed myself, and when an actor was still missing a week before the premiere, I acted myself (laughs). "

In 1989 Zieger moved to Montpellier, where he finished his novel The Box in 1995 . Michael Eberth wrote in a laudation to Ulrich Zieger: "Where would a piece of prose have recently been read in this country that unfolds comparable magical powers when describing our world?" The newspaper Die Welt wrote about the box and Zieger's story The Doubtful Fame of three poets : "Both books are among the best in contemporary German literature."

The prose piece Schwarzland is also taken from the novel Der Kasten , from which Zieger developed a radio play together with the musician Bert Wrede . The two also worked together for the radio play The Hills in Front of the Cities .

In 1997 Zieger took part in the Ingeborg Bachmann Competition in Klagenfurt .

Since the late 1990s, numerous German theaters have commissioned him to write plays, including the Thalia Theater Hamburg , the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz and the Theaterhaus Jena .

In the 2000s, Zieger mainly published poetry. The volume of poetry L'Atelier / Die Werkstatt was published in 2010 by the French publisher Éditions Grèges in German and French. The following year, the German-Swedish publisher Edition Rugerup brought out Waits in the Case . In addition to his literary production, Ulrich Zieger also worked as a translator from French. He translated works by Jean Genet and Boualem Sansal , among others, into German.

In February 2015, Ulrich Zieger's first novel in 20 years was published by S. Fischer Verlag : Durchzug eines Regenbandes .

Ulrich Zieger died in July 2015 at the age of 53 in Montpellier, France, where he lived for many years. His estate is in the literary archive of the Akademie der Künste .

Work overview

Plays

  • The sun is blue , world premiere Freie Kammerspiele Magdeburg, 1998
  • The relocation of the steppe , premiere at Theater 89 Berlin, 1996
  • That between the temples ... the eyes , premiere Mecklenburgisches Staatstheater Schwerin , 1996
  • About the amount of Mandelbrot , first performance Schillertheater Berlin 1993
  • The appearance and the error , premier at the Hanover Theater , 1999
  • The Bones (The Story of Lala S.) , 2000
  • The telling of the whole story , commissioned piece for the Thalia Theater Hamburg, world premiere at Theater Bielefeld 2002
  • SKETCH or Die Weltanschauung , commissioned piece for Theater Bielefeld, world premiere at Theater Bielefeld 2003
  • Before people went to the sea again , commissioned project for the Schaubühne at Lehniner Platz Berlin 1996/2002
  • Return (Woswraschenje) , first performance Thalia Theater Hamburg, 2004
  • The Mayor , World Premiere Theater Bielefeld, 2006
  • What really happened to Betty Boop that evening , 2006
  • Example , 2008

Poetry

prose

Radio plays

  • The hills in front of the cities. Production: DS Kultur and Buschfunk Berlin, 1994
  • Blackland. Production: Druckhaus Galrev, 1995
  • About the progress of the matriarchy. Production: Bayerischer Rundfunk, 2000

Translations

Awards (selection)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Died - Ulrich Zieger . In: buchmarkt.de . July 24, 2015, accessed July 26, 2015.
  2. ↑ a b c d “Walk towards the tracks”. Interview with Ulrich Zieger. In: That between the temples ... the eyes. Program of the Mecklenburg State Theater 1996/1997.
  3. ↑ http://www.heinermueller.de/download/hoerspiel-liste_HM_thalheim_07-05-24.pdf
  4. ↑ Reinhardt Stumm: A meeting in May. In: The appearance and the error. Program of the Lower Saxony State Theater Hanover 1999/2000.
  5. ↑ Uwe Kolbe: Laudation for the Nicolas Born Prize winner 1991 Ulrich Zieger.
  6. ^ Michael Eberth: Laudation for Ulrich Zieger. In: Theater der Zeit May / June 1997.
  7. ^ Writer Ulrich Zieger died at the age of only 53 . In: Deutschlandradio Kultur . July 24, 2015, accessed July 26, 2015.
  8. ↑ easydb.archive. Retrieved October 26, 2018 .
personal data
SURNAME Zieger, Ulrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer
DATE OF BIRTH December 29, 1961
PLACE OF BIRTH Döbeln , German Democratic Republic
DATE OF DEATH 23rd July 2015
Place of death Montpellier , France