For the third year running, the Ministry of Art has confirmed that the Free State wants to provide more support for independent publishers and their books: it is once again supporting them with 50,000 euros ten publication projects by independent publishers and has published a recommendation list with ten outstanding new releases – in which Minister of Art Markus Blume discovered “favourite book potential”.
Publishers with very different publication projects were awarded a “Publisher’s Prize of the Free State of Bavaria 2022”, endowed with 5000 euros each: The Anton G. Leitner Verlag from Weßling, which specializes in poetry, is present with “30 Years of the Poem” on the subject of “Open”, the Hirschkäfer Verlag from Munich with the non-fiction book “Munich Sounds Better With You” by Jens Poenitsch. The Erlangen-based publisher Homunculus is being funded for Rokhl Faygenberg’s novel “On Unknown Paths”, Krachkultur from Munich for the book “Hoffentlich Liebe”, published by Martin Brinkmann and Alexander Behrmann. The Maro-Verlag in Augsburg will be happy about support for the volume of poetry “frank: sonette” by Diane Seuss, the Morisken Verlag in Munich for the support of the graphic novel “Tension” by Sofiia Melnyk. The Munich Stroux-Edition is there with Tatjana Gromača’s novel “Göttliches Kind”, the Munich children’s book publisher by Susanna Rieder with Gianni Rodari’s “Bedtime Stories on the Phone”. And while the Thomas Reche publishing house from Neumarkt was awarded for the publication of Liao Yiwu’s “Prison Escape”, the Volk Verlag in Munich received money for a non-fiction book project by Erich Kasberger: “The Munich Gestapo”.
Searching for clues and swaying floors
The jury put the following ten new publications on the recommendation list “Bavaria’s best independent books 2022” this year: Wiebke Dierks’ “Offspring – when daughters write to their mothers” (& daughters), Michael Batz’ “Das Haus des Paul Levy. Rothenbaumchaussee 26” (Dölling and Galitz) and Günter Derleth’s “…always a lot of light” (Edition Promenade). Slata Roschal’s novel “153 Forms of Nothingness” (Homunculus), which was also on the longlist for the German Book Prize, is among them, as is Wolfgang Martynkewicz’ “The Swaying of the Ground Beneath Your Feet” (Maro). Katharina Bendixen’s youth book “Tara’s Eyes” (Mixtvision) is praised, as is the language art booklet “Auf ein Maoam mit Otto” by Bea Michl and Emil Bach (Schillo). The jury liked Andreas K. Vetter’s non-fiction book “Unreasonable Design” (Spurbuchverlag), as did Angela von Gans’ search for traces of the German-Jewish writer Emma Bonn (Stroux Edition) and Fritz Stiegler’s novel “Heiner” (Volk Verlag). The award-winning publishers will be presented at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October and on 26./27. November at the Market of Independent Publishers at the Munich Literature Festival.