The German-Russian Year of Language and Literature
The German-Russian Year of Language and Literature is Crowned with an Exhibition in Moscow about Thomas Mann
June 19th, 2015
This month an exhibition about Thomas Mann’s life started at the Ivan Turgenev Museum in Moscow and will be open for the public to visit until September. The photo installation has been created to celebrate the 140th anniversary of Thomas Mann’s birth and the Year of German Language and Literature in Russia. The Special Envoy for International Cultural Cooperation to the President of Russia, Mikhail Shvydkoy declared that this event is a symbolical event for Germany and Russia.
Thomas Mann called Russian literature "sacred." Fazil Iskander wrote in his book, Russian Studies in Literature, that Mann’s words could be interpreted as "great humanistic zeal of classic” Russian literature.
In addition to this event, on June 6th the museum celebrated the Day of Russian Language, and the birthday of Alexander Pushkin as well as Thomas Mann, who was born on the same day 140 years ago.
Germany is represented in Russia by more than 200 scientists, scholars, writers and artists. In order that this event could be organized a strong cooperation between the German embassy and Consulates General, the German Academic Exchange Service, the Central Agency for Schools Abroad and representatives of German foundations in Russia was needed. Another event promoting cooperation between the two countries was the Red Square event which drew a crowd of 8,000 young people. An addition interest in German as a foreign language was confirmed by the participation of 1,500 German teachers at the German Teachers Conference in Moscow, which was held in November.
References and Links
- See more at: https://www.deutschland.de/en/topic/knowledge/education-learning/the-german-russian-year-of-language-and-literature
Izabella Sipos, Berlin Global
