Upcoming Events

Remembering Ernst Toller (1893-1939): Exiles and Refugees between Europe and the US

(Pictured - Manhattan Island (Abbildung aus Toller: Quer durch, TW 4.1, S. 9)

With support from the DAAD, the Max Kade Foundation, the Ernst-Toller-Gesellschaft, the Austrian Cultural Forum, and the administrations of Hunter College and Mary Immaculate College, we are proud to host the upcoming international conference "Remembering Ernst Toller (1893-1939): Exiles and Refugees between Europe and the US," which will take place on May 30-June 1, 2019.

The spring of 1919 saw the brutal end of the Bavarian soviet republic that had emerged as part of Germany's November Revolution. Twenty years later, on May 22, 1939, Ernst Toller, one of the leaders of that revolution and republic, committed suicide at the Mayflower Hotel in New York, where he was living in exile from Nazi Germany. To commemorate these anniversaries, we are organizing this conference on German-speaking exiles in New York and the United States, and their legacy for today's exiles and refugees. Registration is required. For the registration form and a preliminary program, please see https://www.ernst-toller.de/tagung-new-york-city/.

On May 31 at 5:00, the conference will feature a reading by Anna Funder, one of Australia's most acclaimed and celebrated writers (Pictured left. Photo credit Gaby Waldek). Her multi-award winning novel All That I Am is an homage to four extraordinary German anti-Hitler activists in exile in the 1930s. It is narrated, in part, by the character Ernst Toller. All That I Am won the Miles Franklin Prize, Australia's most prestigious fiction award. It spent over one and a half years on the bestseller list, and is published in 25 countries. Her book Stasiland tells true stories of people who heroically resisted the communist dictatorship of East Germany, and of people who worked for the Stasi. A contemporary classic, Stasiland won the 2004 Samuel Johnson Prize for best non-fiction in English. Anna is a former DAAD Fellow in Berlin, Australia Council Fellow, and Rockefeller Foundation Fellow. She lives in Sydney.

Anna Funder's reading will be followed by a conversation with Benjamin Carter Hett. Hett has taught at Harvard and, since 2003, at Hunter College and the CUNY Graduate Center. He is the author of The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic (Henry Holt, 2018), named one of the year's best books by The Times of London and the Daily Telegraph. His other books include Burning the Reichstag: An Investigation into the Third Reich's Enduring Mystery (Oxford, 2014) and Crossing Hitler: The Man Who Put the Nazis on the Witness Stand (Oxford, 2008), which was made into a documentary film and a television drama for the BBC. Hett has also been the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the American Council of Learned Societies. (Hett pictured below).

Past Events

10th Annual Festival Neue Literatur

The 10th annual Festival Neue Literatur will take place from March 29-31, 2019, bringing to New York contemporary writers from Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and the US.  This year's theme is "In Memory We Trust."  We are very proud that Hunter German major Sean Crisp will participate in the "Words With Writers" event on March 29!  The event is free of charge but an RSVP is required.  Click on the links above for more details. 

"Facing Fears and Furies: The Unexpurgated Brothers Grimm" by PETER WORTSMAN

Date: Thursday, October 25, 2018 

Time: 6 PM

Location: The Chanin Language Center - Cecile Insdorf Screening Room B126 Hunter West (Subway Level)

Introduction by Hillary Keel Strohmeier.

Open to students, faculty, and outside guests. Peter Wortsman's books will be available for purchase at the event.