Stories Between Grey and Glitter

Reading and Discussion with Lenka Elbe and Tina Pruschmann

Moderation: Christina Frankenberg

In the Ore Mountains, in the towns of Tann and St. Joachimsthal/Jáchymov - whose history is shaped by uranium mining as well as the operation of spa resorts—two extraordinary novels unfold, with their authors blending real events with fairy-tale and fantastical elements.

Tina Pruschmann’s novel Bittere Wasser (2022) centers on the life of Ida. Her parents work in the state circus of the GDR; her mother is a trapeze artist, her father trains elephants. Ida herself performs in the ring. However, when school begins, she is sent to her grandparents in Tann, where Wismut mines uranium. After reunification, when the mine closes, Ida leaves. Something draws her to Ukraine.

Around the same time, the Englishman Henry Robotham begins his journey to Jáchymov in Lenka Elbe’s novel Uranova (2020). Here, the last trace of his friend Angela had disappeared; she had traveled to Czechoslovakia in 1968 to trace her Czech ancestors. Henry Robotham arrives in a town that is eerily deserted, with grand spa hotels on one side and the remnants of Stalinist labor camps - where prisoners were worked to death in uranium mines - on the other. Amid these contrasts, a breathtaking struggle between good and evil unfolds.

The LESELUST GOES EUROPE literary days are part of the Chemnitz2025 program.