Helga Schubert

In the early 1980s, a woman strolls through East Berlin after work because she doesn’t want to be the first one home. A child breathes in for the first time, a grandmother breathes out for the last time. And a woman in her middle years tries to come to terms with a cancer diagnosis. Helga Schubert, who only became famous in reunified Germany a few years ago, collects texts from 65 years of writing in her new book.

In her stories, Schubert tells of longing and wanderlust, of dictatorship and inner freedom. She speaks of being at peace with life – just as it is.

Helga Schubert was a psychotherapist and writer in the GDR. During the period of reunification, she was the non-party press spokesperson for the Central Round Table in East Berlin for four months. After a publication break of almost 20 years, she won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 2020 with the story Vom Aufstehen; since then she has been publishing again, e.g. Der heutige Tag. A Book of Hours of Love (2023). In 2024, Helga Schubert was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit and the MV State Culture Prize.