German Literary Institutions: The Berlin Seminar
June 4 - 15, 2023

German Literary Institutions: The Berlin Seminar (GLIB) -- open to faculty and advanced graduate students in German studies and related fields -- brings together scholars of German literary and cultural studies with experts and leading figures of Germany’s literary scene. Fellows have the opportunity to engage personally with, and learn first-hand from, representatives from different areas of Germany’s vibrant literary field: distinguished authors, literary agents, successful publishers and booksellers, top literary and theater critics working for print or on-line publications and public radio, directors of Germany’s literary archives, practicing translators and others involved in the production, dissemination, and reception of literature in Germany.

In addition to seminar sessions with critics, authors, agents and other representatives of the German literary business at Berlin’s Literaturhaus, our home base, the program includes attending a staff meeting at one of Berlin’s premier newspapers, touring and visiting the Deutschlandradio, attending plays at different Berlin stages, including the Maxim Gorki Theatre, Germany's first post-migrant stage, discussions with students in creative writing at the Universität der Künste, an excursion to the Fontane Archive in Potsdam, and meetings in the headquarters of Matthes & Seitz and of the venerable Suhrkamp Verlag (see the 2023 program here).

Attending the Berlin Seminar on German Literary Institutions provides participants with a comprehensive and uniquely valuable body of knowledge. The close-knit community that develops in the course of the seminar and its unique format, the collective inquiry into the German literary business, further contribute to the experience. In the past, participants have left the seminar with a renewed sense of purpose, underscoring their own role as teachers, public intellectuals, and scholars who collectively research and write about German literature and culture.

Participants have come from all academic ranks and many different institutions, ranging from small colleges to large state and private universities, including Denison University, Washington University, Duke, Brown, Michigan State, Juniata College, UCLA, UC Irvine, Northern Michigan University, Ohio State, the University of Kansas, Wake Forest, Indiana State, UNC-Greensboro, Bowling Green, Queens College/CUNY, Virginia Tech, University of Illinois, Chicago, Brandeis University, Rutgers University, University of North Texas, University of Richmond, University of Idaho, Swansea University, the University of Limerick, Fudan University in China, and the Universität Duisburg-Essen. Please note that the seminar is conducted in German.

GLIB is co-directed by William Collins Donahue (University of Notre Dame) and Martin Kagel (University of Georgia) and sponsored by the Max Kade Foundation and the University of Notre Dame in partnership with the University of Georgia.
Click here to see the 2023 Seminar Cohort
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"It was one of the most informative and interesting scholarly programs I have ever been a part of. And it was certainly the most fun that I have had so far in my academic career."
-James F. Howell, Adjunct Lecturer, University of Arizona

"Together with authors, artists, entrepreneurs, and some of the key players at Berlin’s cultural institutions […] conversations evolved that went far beyond the mere logistics of Germany’s Literaturbetrieb, but tirelessly tackled questions of literature’s role, its challenges, and opportunities in the 21st century. "
-Anne von Petersdorff, Doctoral Candidate, Michigan State University
Click here to see the 2023 seminar schedule and readings.

Here is what former participants say:

"Most impressive was the caliber of people that the seminar organizers arranged for close interaction and first-hand accounts of how literary institutions function; the organizers' connections are vast and absolutely first-rate. Those connections include Volker Schlöndorff, Terézia Mora, Petra Hardt, and Karin Graf as practitioners of the field. It was also once in a career opportunity to see Deutschland Funk, Tagesspiegel, the Bertolt Brecht archive, and the Suhrkamp Verlag from the inside." 
-Gary L Baker, Professor of German, Denison University

"From my perspective, the seminar filled a profound gap in the general disciplinary approach to literature found within North American German Studies, where the industry and business of acquisitions, talent-scouting, rights and translations, and promotion are still seen as a secondary bundle of concerns, while the intimacy between individual reader and written page is often prized as the only meaningful and imaginative relationship in literary studies. Unfortunately, that ends up being a rather unrealistic view of how literature is made—today, as ever. In this sense, the seminar program expressed a commitment to understanding literary and cultural production in the actual, and often compromised, social and institutional circumstances where men and women labor to make it. "
-David Gramling, Associate Professor,  University of Arizona

"Fascinating topic, great venues, excellent organization: This seminar made me realize the importance of knowing how literary institutions (the Literaturbetrieb) shape the production, distribution, and evaluation of contemporary German literature. Anybody who studies contemporary literature needs to have this kind of knowledge."
-Thomas Kniesche, Associate Professor, Brown University 

"During the Notre Dame Berlin Seminar on the German Literaturbetrieb I learned a tremendous amount about a side of literature that for U.S.-based scholars of German literature and culture usually plays at best a secondary role: the creation, dissemination, and professional reception of texts that scholars analyze and the market conditions driving decisions made by writers, editors, publishers, designers, agents, awards committees, and reviewers. […] I felt part of an intellectual community where all just cared about deeper understanding – the kind of community that all too often is lost in everyday university life."
- Esther K. Bauer, Associate Professor, Virginia Tech

​Read "Wer möchte schon ständig verhätschelt werden? Eine internationale Betrachtung zur Erosion der Kritik im Literaturbetrieb" by Martin Kagel and William Collins Donahue, published 26 July 2019 in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, inspired by discussions held at the 2019 Seminar.
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Read "Eine Liebeserklärung an den deutschen Kulturbetrieb" by William Collins Donahue, published 23 July 2018 in the Berliner Zeitung. Also available for download here.

​Read Die große Mischkalkulation: Institutions, Social Import, and Market Forces in the German Literary Field edited by William Collins Donahue and Martin Kagel, with contributions from Geoffrey Allen Baker, Esther Bauer, Victoria Bläser, Necia Chronister, William Collins Donahue, David Gramling, Marike Janzen, Martin Kagel, Molly Knight, Heidi Madden, Matthias Pabsch, Rolf Parr, Julian Preece, Steffen Richter, Claire Amanda Ross, Volker Schlöndorff, Thomas Scholz, Donna Stonecipher, Sarah Traylor, and Ulrike Wiethaus; published 04 December 2020 by Wilhelm Fink Verlag.
German Literary Institutions: The Berlin Seminar
sponsored by the University of Notre Dame ​in partnership with the University of Georgia