Circle of writing workers

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The circles of writing workers were a form of organization of the "artistic folk creation" in the GDR on the subject of literature . From 1970 circle leaders were also trained by the district culture academies of the districts . Sometimes they were also referred to as the writing workers' movement . Professional writers also emerged from them.

history

The ideological basis for the formation of this circle was the Bitterfeld path , the associated slogan was: Grab your pen, mate! After the Bitterfeld Conference in 1959, over 300 literary circles emerged.

Some members of the circles were already organized in the circles of writing pioneers during their school days, which were located in the pioneer houses or schools. Anyone interested could join a circle of writing workers. He usually met in a cultural center . The lignite combine 'Erich Weinert' Deuben played a pioneering role, and with the Deubner Blätter its circle members wanted to set new standards nationwide on the way to a “socialist national culture”.

Each circle had an artistic director, often a writer, who received a fee for this work. Many well-known authors were also active as circle leaders or supported the circle work, including Brigitte Reimann ( Black Pump Hoyerswerda), Christa and Gerhard Wolf ( Waggonbau Ammendorf ), Heiner Müller (Klettwitz), Eduard Klein ( Berlin-Chemie ), Hans-Georg Lietz ( Neptunwerft Rostock), Tom Crepon (Neubrandenburg) and ER Greulich (circle writing teachers Berlin) and Hasso Grabner (Leuna). The financial security as circle leaders enabled many of them to maintain their status as freelance writers and offered social security.

The planning provided that at the meetings of the circle first some kind of further training on the theory of socialist realism should be given. In addition, newly published works of GDR and Soviet literature were discussed, and verse teaching and the like were on the program. Then the participants read out their own texts and then discussed them. Ultimately, however, the content and implementation of the circle meetings were always largely dependent on the individual circle leaders. In some cases, when the circle leaders had developed methods that were too independent, the circles were monitored by the State Security and the artistic directors were subject to measures. There were opportunities for public appearance at the workers' festivals and other cultural events such as town festivals, etc. There were also publications of individual circles in the form of brochures. Since 1960, the magazine I write has been published monthly, which was published by the Central House for Cultural Work of the GDR as a “magazine for the movement of writing workers” and contained both theoretical and literary texts.

The path of some young authors continued until 1974 in the Working Group of Young Authors (AJA) of the GDR Writers' Association . In 1974 this model of promoting young talent was replaced by the introduction of candidate status (pre-membership in the Writers' Association). Some circle members have also completed a distance learning course at the literature institute "Johannes R. Becher" in Leipzig.

A number of well-known writers emerged from the circles or were active in them and used the opportunity to exchange ideas. Well-known circle participants are, for example, Jan Eik (House of DSF Berlin), Martin Selber (Wanzleben), Helmut Preißler (Frankfurt / Oder and Eisenhüttenstadt), Gerald Höfer (Sondershausen), Jürgen Kögel (Berlin), Charlotte Worgitzky (Berlin) and Joachim Specht (Dessau). Volker Braun , Bernd Jentzsch and Bernd Schirmer were members of a group of writing students in Leipzig.

After the fall of the Wall, some circles worked together with the Working Group on Literature in the Working World in the old federal states, and in some cases published joint publications. About a fifth of the circles were continued under a new name and many of them are still active today. An extensive collection of manuscripts and typescripts from circle members as well as secondary texts on the circle work is today in the Archives Writing Workers of the association SchreibArt e. V. kept in Berlin.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Peter Huebner: Workers in State Socialism. Ideological claim and social reality. Böhlau Verlag, 2005, pp. 178-179.

literature

  • Roland Berbig (ed.): The Pankow poetry club. Literary circles in the GDR. Links, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-86153-214-X .
  • Rüdiger Bernhardt : On the history of the movement of writing workers. In: Martin Luther University, Halle-Wittenberg. Scientific journal. Social and Linguistic Series. Vol. 19, No. 1, 1970, ISSN  0438-4385 , pp. 69-103.
  • Rüdiger Bernhardt: "Grab your pen, buddy!" - The movement of writing workers. In: Archive of writing workers (ed.): Stimulus and phenomenon. The literature of the writing workers. A discourse in the area of ​​tension between the experiences of vision and German-German reality. Abes Öko-Druck- und Verlag, Berlin 1996, pp. 25–40.
  • Rüdiger Bernhardt, Anne Klose, Jürgen Kögel, Reinhard Kranz, Dolores Pieschke, Peter Rausch, Britta Suckow: Diversity and monotony. The movement of the writing workers in the GDR - their circles, their texts and their archive - in interplay with society then and now (= "hefte zur gdr-geschichte", No. 134), Helle Panke, Berlin 2015.
  • Federal Executive of the FDGB, Department of Culture (Ed.): A good word for a good deed. 25 years of the writing worker movement. Issue 1–2. Federal Executive of the FDGB, Department of Culture, Berlin 1984.
  • Beloved Republic: From the work of our writing workers , Karl-Marx-Stadt 1960.