Lesung und Gespräch mit Michael Lentz

Michael Lentz was born in Düren. He studied German language and literature, philosophy, and history in Aachen and Munich, earning his doctorate in 1998 with a thesis on sound poetry and sound music after 1945. He lives in Berlin and Leipzig.
Lentz is a writer, musician, performance artist, literary scholar, and editor. He has published numerous novels, poetry collections, radio plays, audiobooks (CDs), stage plays, and essays, as well as works of acoustic literature and musical compositions. Most recently, he edited the *Neue Rundschau* issue titled "Briefgedicht Klanggedicht Liedgedicht Metagedicht Gedichtgedicht" (Letter Poem, Sound Poem, Song Poem, Meta-Poem, Poem-Poem; Issue 4/2025, S. Fischer 2026).
As a saxophonist, this "gifted artist of language" (Andreas Puff-Trojan, Südwestrundfunk) performs in ensembles such as the trios Lentz Geisse Wertmüller and Lentz Pliakas Wertmüller (alongside Gunnar Geisse, Marino Pliakas, and Michael Wertmüller).
In 2006, Michael Lentz was appointed Professor of Literary Writing at the German Literature Institute in Leipzig, a position he holds to this day. He has been a member of the German Academy for Language and Literature since 2014.
Lentz has received numerous awards, including the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize (2001), the Prize of the Literature Houses (2005), the Walter Hasenclever Literature Prize (2012), and, most recently, the Bettina Brentano Prize for Contemporary Poetry (2024). He has held visiting professorships in poetics in cities including Frankfurt, Kiel, Cologne, Paderborn, and Vienna.

Selected Publications:

Heimwärts, Roman. S. Fischer (2024)
Grönemeyer, S. Fischer (2024)
Chora Gedichte, S. Fischer (2023)
Schattenfroh. Ein Requiem, Roman. S. Fischer (2018)
Atmen Ordnung Abgrund, Frankfurter Poetikvorlesungen. S. Fischer (2013)
Offene Unruh Gedichte, S. Fischer (2010)
Pazifik Exil, Roman S. Fischer (2007)
Muttersterben, Erzählungen. S. Fischer (2002)

Max Lawton was born in Brussels and grew up in Chicago.

He received his BA in Russian Literature and Culture from Columbia University. He received the Clarendon Fund Scholarship for his Masters of Philosophy from The Queen's College, Oxford. He lives in Los Angeles.

In addition to Russian, Lawton has translated from French and German, such as Jonathan Littell's The Damp and the Dry and Michael Lentz's novel Schattenfroh.

Lawton's translation of Red Pyramid: Selected Stories by Vladimir Sorokin won the 2025 AATSEEL prize for Best Translation of Prose into English. In 2026, Lawton's translation of Schattenfroh by Michael Lentz from German to English won the Helen and Kurt Wolff Translator's Prize.