Start: 7:00 p.m.
With Matthias Kniep
Moderator: Marie Schmidt
Opening remarks by Martin Schulze Wessel
Admission: €10 / €7; members of Freundeskreis of the Lyrikkabinett: free admission
Tickets available at the door; unreserved seating
“If this testimonial poetry weren’t so sad, it would simply be beautiful. It captures the intensity of everyday life under a state of emergency and shows that life-changing events can lead to the utmost vitality and affirmation of life, to the utmost clarity—even in lyrical expression” (Alexandru Bulucz, SZ). Oksana Maksymchuk, born in 1982 in Lviv, Ukraine, holds a doctorate in ancient philosophy. In February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, she was in Budapest and decided to remain in the West. She now writes her poetry in English. In 2025, Still City (Diary of an Invasion) was nominated for the longlist of the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Pen/Voelcker Award for Poetry. At the recommendation of the Lyrik Kabinett, Maksymchuk will be a fellow at Villa Waldberta from April to June 2026. Matthias Kniep is a translator, freelance writer, and regular editor of the Jahrbuch der Lyrik; he serves as a juror in many contexts and is a program curator at the Haus für Poesie in Berlin. Marie Schmidt, who has been with the Süddeutsche Zeitung since 2018, received the German Reporter Award in 2018 and the Alfred Kerr Prize in 2019.
A collaboration with the Lyrik Kabinett and the Artist-in-Residence program of
Villa Waldberta / Ebenböckhaus, City of Munich
The remains of a universe: What is most important to some living being is now in the back of a truck I speeding through seething steppe, in a bag, with a U-shaped zipper, and a handle I inside it another bag, much smaller, holding a hand, and some lose digitsOksana Maksymchuk, Diary of an Invasion. Poems, Edition Lyrik Kabinett, published by Hanser, 2025.