Simple Language Literature
Accessible Literature

“Kultur für alle” – culture for everyone – was a political demand in the 1970s. In 2008, the Kultur für ALLE association was founded in Frankfurt. Now Hauke Hückstädt, director of the Frankfurt Literaturhaus, has published a volume of stories with simple-language literature in this tradition that is quite worth reading.

By Holger Moos

© Piper “Simple language is a language we have forgotten,” writes Hauke ​​Hückstädt in the afterword of LiES. Das Buch. Literatur in Einfacher Sprache (The Book: Literature in Simple Language). This is true in schools, universities, and professional life. Everyone approves of the slogan “culture for everyone,” but no one is actually implementing it. A number of barriers such as physical or mental limitations, but also language barriers often impede access to “high” literature. That was the starting point.
 
The aim of the stories written between 2016 and 2019 was to create a literature that excludes no one. Thirteen authors had to submit to rules that were certainly unusual for them. They were asked to use simple words, many verbs, few nouns, and to write simple sentences. Figures of speech had to be explained. Participants included contemporary authors like Kristof Magnusson, Judith Hermann, Alissa Walser, and Arno Geiger.

Reduced toolbox 

It’s not easy to achieve the specified ambitious goal using simple means. Simplicity is, as we know, very complicated. With a reduced toolbox, the authors were asked to create literature possessing a high degree of “practical value,” in other words “as useful and generally comprehensible as fire extinguishers, bottle openers, woollen blankets, and ladders.”
 
The stories cover a broad range of subject matter. Julia Schoch devotes herself to the personal topic of falling in and out of love. In theory, it’s easy to say, “I’m leaving you.” It’s a short statement; just as short as that said at the beginning of a love story: I love you. “Three words at the beginning, three words at the end. The most important things in life can be said in very few words.” That last sentence could be the motto of this volume of short stories. But the ending of Schoch’s story also reminds us: Language isn’t everything; what counts are actions.

Touching yet accessible

Alissa Walser writes about the persecution of Jews during the Second World War from the perspective of Margot Frank, the sister of the famous Anne Frank. Jens Mühling depicts his journey around the Black Sea. Anna Kim writes of old Ms Kleinau, who doesn’t like people or change until one day a cleaning woman brings adventure into her life. Henning Ahrens also contributes a very everyday story, namely that of Lotto-Heinz, who loves playing the numbers, much to his wife’s displeasure.


 The stories from everyday life are certainly the most touching and most accessible. But thematic diversity is another strength of the book and accordingly opens up many forms of access. A line break after each sentence also makes reading easier. Overall, the volume absolutely lives up to its high standards. The book has also been published as an audio book.