The sponsorship award for young literature, awarded by the Fördergemeinschaft Herrenhof Mußbach in cooperation with the cultural office of the city of Neustadt, will in future be named after the long-time FGH chairman Gustav-Adolf Bähr, who died last year, and will also receive a much more attractive prize. The next winners will be announced in July.
The prize, which is open to young writers up to 35 years of age from the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region, was awarded for the first time in 2018 at the second Neustadt youth culture festival “Querfallenein”. “At that time Gustav-Adolf Bähr was still a member of the jury himself,” reports Katharina Dück, the spokeswoman for the FGH’s literature working group, which also organizes the regular “Literaturvilla” readings in the Herrenhof. Even these would never have come about without Bähr, says Dück.
The prize will in future be endowed with 5300 euros, which will be distributed among the top three winners (2500, 1500 and 1000 euros) and a sponsorship award for authors under 16 (300 euros) and primarily from sponsors such as the “Vereinigung Pfälzer Kunstfreunde” Will be provided. At the premiere of the prize in 2018, the total was only 1,300 euros. As in the past, a topic is given again this time – “limits” – which should be treated in poetry or short prose (including essays) with a maximum of 5000 characters. In terms of content, however, there is great freedom, said Dück. The texts must be sent to [email protected] as Word files with a short cover letter and the subject “Förderpreis der Literaturvilla” by June 1st. They must not have been published yet. The longlist reading with the ten best contributions is planned for July 1st in the Herrenhof, the reading of the shortlist with the award ceremony on July 18th. The longlist texts are also to appear in a separate publication in the “Brot & Kunst” publishing house. In the future, the prize is to be awarded every two years. 2020 was suspended – because of Corona.
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