Status: 14.10.2023, 13:00 PM
By: Sven Trautwein
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Four different titles awaited the audience on October 13 in the Literary Quartet. And there was a change right from the start.
Eva Menasse, Mithu Sanyal, Jakob Augstein and Thea Dorn discussed various novels in the current issue of the Literary Quartet. Four books were on the agenda, including the latest novel by Daniel Kehlmann, who will give the eulogy for Salman Rushdie at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Rushdie will receive the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 2023. In addition to the lively discussion about the four novels, the focus was on a novelty that was not mentioned in the show.
Host Thea Dorn discusses four books in the "Literary Quartet" with Jakob Augstein, Eva Menasse and Mithu Sanyal. © Svea Pietschmann/ZDF
The beginning of the October issue of "The Literary Quartet" was as harmonious as the broadcast on September 15, which caused a lot of laughter. Here they had agreed on a favorite book. At that time, Juli Zeh even chose the book "Small Problems" by Nele Pollatschek as the best book of the show.
The Literary Quartet: caught up in world affairs
There was a little less laughter in the current show, although the exchange of mutual criticism of books was not neglected. The trigger was the current events in the Middle East. Hostess Thea Dorn found it difficult to find words at the beginning, because the course of the show was supposed to be about the book "War". Louis-Ferdinand Céline wrote it during the First World War. Thousands of manuscript pages disappeared and only resurfaced in 2021. The writer is widely regarded as problematic and at times anti-Semitic.
Not everyone has to like every kind of world literature!
Eva Menasse
Jakob Augstein, who presented the book "War", found it extremely worth reading. Around this title, a lively discussion broke out about which kind of book is worth a look and which is not. Denis Utlu's book "Father's Sea" was also not consistent. It was quite different with the opening with "Lichtspiel" by Daniel Kehlmann, which all the guests of the show booked as a great book with minor weaknesses. On the other hand, Benjamin von Stuckrad-Barre's book "Still awake?" failed in one of the previous broadcasts.
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In the run-up to the recording, which took place at the Berliner Ensemble, presenter Thea Dorn shared that there will be a big change in the broadcast of the Literary Quartet. Even though there will still be a lively round of books worth reading, there will no longer be a show with a live audience from December. Since the medium of television is constantly changing, they want to try out the new format with a different stage design. Whether there will be a return to the live audience at some point, Ms. Dorn left open.