by Janine Ludwig
From October 27 to November 2, 2025, Bremen’s renowned annual international Festival for Border-Crossing Literature called Globale took place. We had the honor of being invited to the opening night, a festive event in the Town Hall.
Afterwards, we listened to a reading of excerpts from David Safier’s book Die Liebe sucht in Zimmer (Love in Search for a Room) by the famous actress Anna Thalbach, intermingled with Uni Bremen’s Prof. Dr. Karen Struve interviewing the author to explain the complex and captivating story of his book. Our students were able to obtain a signed copy afterwards.
During the subsequent festive reception, our Dickinson students met several interesting people, including a group of Ukrainian students from Odesa, who were attending a research week at the Research Centre for East European Studies at the University of Bremen and who invited our students for a joint dinner the next evening.
Many fascinating events, readings, and talks followed throughout the week, including, on Oct 29, a talk by Dr. Oxana Matiychuk with the title “Literature in/From the War: A Report from Chernivtsi,” which was introduced by Prof. Dr. Susanne Schattenberg, head of the Research Center for Eastern Europe.
On Nov 1, a discussion was held between Heike Paul and Marcel Dirsus (author of How Tyrants Fall: And How Nations Survive) on: “Looking West: On the Current Situation in the United States.”
The same day, a reading (with interview) of Dmitrij Kapitelman’s Russische Spezialitäten (Russian Specialties) explored the heartbreaking attempt of a Ukrainian German from Kyiv, who grew up in Leipzig, to convince his own mother—who lives safely in Germany and has been taken in by Russian propaganda—that it is Putin who is attacking Ukraine, not the other way around.
This wonderful literature festival has been founded and run for a long time by Libuše Černa. Last year, she handed over to a young team, led by Tatjana Vogel and Daniel Schmidt, who was an exchange student from the University of Bremen at Dickinson College a few years ago.