The Russian-Jewish writer Maria Stepanova has been awarded the Leipzig Book Prize for European Understanding.
The 50-year-old accepted the prize, which is worth 20,000 euros, on Wednesday evening in Leipzig.
Leipzig - Stepanova has lived in exile in Berlin since the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine.
The author was honored for her book of poetry, “Girls Without Clothes”.
Writer Ilma Rakusa paid tribute to Stepanova.
The term world poetry fits hardly any contemporary poet as well as her.
The theme of her books is memory, "which sifts through, collects and sorts fragments of personal and collective history in order to place them in new, unfamiliar contexts and snatch them from oblivion".
Stepanova thanked her.
"My voice can be heard, and I am infinitely grateful for that - grateful to those who have done everything to make it perceptible in German-speaking countries".
She is doing her best "to resist the forces that are using our language as an instrument of violence and death."
The book fair was opened with a ceremony for the award.
According to Karin Schmidt-Friderichs, Head of the German Book Trade Association, the fair exudes enthusiasm for books, guarantees diversity of opinion and is an opportunity for small publishers.
Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth referred to the importance of literature.
"We read because we have no other means of understanding and opening up the world to us," said the Green politician.
Whoever visits the Leipzig Book Fair has the whole world at their feet.
It is important to oppose all misery, war, hunger, violence and destruction in the world with the culture of democracy.
In a humorous speech, Austria's President Alexander Van der Bellen dealt with the peculiarities of language and dialects.
Austria is the guest country of the book fair.
After three years of the compulsory Corona break, the fair and the associated reading festival "Leipzig Reads" open their doors to the public from Thursday to Sunday.
According to the trade fair, a good 2,000 exhibitors from 40 countries will be presenting their book-related innovations.
In the pre-crisis year of 2019, there were around 2,500 exhibitors.
dpa