Dramaturgie im zeitgenössischen Tanz ist ? positiv gemeint ? ein heißes Eisen. Idealerweise sind Dramaturginnen und Dramaturgen während der Erarbeitung eines Stücks die besten Freunde der Choreografen.
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While Italy is naming swimming pools after Mussolini's most glorified fascists, Hong Kong is demonstrating a new and refreshingly independent spirit. Polish writer Bartosz Zurawiecki laments how the Kaczynski government is sticking its nose in artists' business. And Praxiteles' sculpture of Aphrodite of Knidos continues to knock the socks off her beholders.
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Heiner Bastian, curator of Berlin's Hamburger Bahnhof museum, has raised a stir by resigning on the grounds that the city's culture bigwigs don't do enough for contemporary contemporary art. The NZZ is somewhat miffed by Lars von Trier's new comedy, shot without human intent. And Berlin-based Serbian writer Bora Cosic relates his trip to the Beckett-like haunts of Belgrade.
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The Bologna process is wreaking havoc in the social sciences in Switzerland. A retrospective of the work of Daniel Spoerri in Prato demonstrates the artist's refusal to be put in a categorical drawer. The future looks dry for Spain, writes the FAZ. Fears have replaced actual dangers in the middle class, says the taz. And Mahatma Ghandi has made his way into Frankfurt fitness studios.
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Russian writer Viktor Erofeyev objects to the West portraying Russia as a cockroach nest in the House of Europe. A French court asks: in going at the "Pissoir" with a hammer, did Pierre Pinoncelli actually hit Duchamp's work? And an homage to Kazimir Malevich gathers often ludicrous takes on the famous Black Square.
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Günter Grass calls the German press a "summary court." The clatter of the typewriter has Polish author Adam Zagajewski all dewey-eyed. Physicist and writer Ulrich Woelk talks about the Higgs Bosun particle and what to do if Cern can't catch it. Software writer turned art collector Ivo Wessel explains collecting as egotism. And the world, says "Persepolis" creator Marjane Satrapi, is round, not divided in two.
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Die Welt regrets that, two hundred years after the abolition of slavery, Britain is still living in denial. Meanwhile, the Canadian War Museum is having to defend its characterisation of the Allied bombing of Germany. Writer Monica Maron is appalled by Germany's quickness to forget murdered journalist Anna Politkovskaya and forgive Vladimir Putin. And former popstar Yello thinks the advantage of being an artist is that anything you make is art.
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Author Navid Kermani celebrates 50 years of the Treaty of Rome by shouting, "Beat your swords into agricultural subsidies!" The European public sphere was healthier before the First World War, says the FR. The FAZ is astonished at a court ruling that wife-beating is no grounds for immediate divorce. And British architect David Chipperfield explains why the petition against his plans for Berlin's Museum Island is pure nonsense.
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Author Ingo Schulze talks about East German writers' sense of wonderment. The Leipzig Book Prize for European Understanding goes to an Eastward-looking German and a Westward-looking Russian. On the first day of spring, the urban starlings are busy immitating police sirens. And the CDU should wise up and stop trying to prevent Germans from saying 'lifestyle club'.
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The SZ takes objection to Günter Grass' poetic revenge directed at the press. Polish historian Bogdan Musial has pointed out that sociologist Zygmunt Bauman is standing in a glass house. Author Maxim Biller gives the low-down on love. And Tine Rahel Völcker's newest play releases a Schilleresque Tarzan cry.
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Author Peter Schneider sees nothing but chickenheartedness in admirers of former RAF terrorist Christian Klar. Writer Sybille Lewitscharoff warns of the literary dangers of zeitgeist overkill. The FAZ looks at Dutch hypocrisy: pea soup and Rembrant for them, pasta and porn for us. The NZZ is left breathless by a private Hermann Hesse archive. And Iraqi writer Najem Wali describes being the only Arab at the Jerusalem Book Fair.
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Writer Michael Kleeberg paints Jacques Chirac as hero to French petty-bourgeois squares. Milan Kundera's surveillance reports from communist times tell what he bought but not what he thought. Swedish writer Per Olov Enquist asks what Sweden's rural bachelors are going to do now all the strong women have moved away. Austrian German is causing linguistic mayhem at the EU. And the FAZ bewails the death of Shakespeare in Vienna.
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Alexandr Solzhenitsyn has published a new postscript to his novel "The Red Wheel" which is being read as a vote in favour of Putin. Victor Erofeyev fears that Taiwan is being swallowed up by all but democratic forces. In the ongoing multiculturalism debate, Timothy Garton Ash defends his right to disagree in the name of solidarity. And the new bridge to be built over the Elbe in Dresden isn't doomed to ruin the view.
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Polish author Andrzej Stasiuk explains what it's like to live between German robots and Russian beasts. Photographs by Thomas Struth have infiltrated the august Prado. Theatre director Claus Peymann reiterates his support for anti-capitalist ex-RAF terrorist Christian Klar. And immigrants to Turkey are still not allowed to work as shoe-makers.
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Die Welt is tired of being told where to smoke and how to park while the taz sees the difference between war and peace disappearing. Objections to David Chipperfield's plans for the Museum Island amount to a plea for Disneyland. "The Marriage of Figaro" in Zurich has got Susanna playing with the wooden dowel of her nuptial bed. And Johannesburg is finding ever new ways to crown a fence.
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Debbie Tucker Green's super-short plays pack a powerful political punch. Stephane Braunschweig has staged a good-as-it-gets Chekhov in Strasbourg. An exhibition in Berlin remembers hymn writer Paul Gerhardt, for many Germany's first rhyme slinger. And composer Volker David Kirchner bemoans today's disposable music industry.
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The FAZ recommends keeping an eye on outsider Francois Bayrou, who polls say would become French president in a run-off vote. The Greeks and the Turks go to video war to decide which country is more gay. Filmmaker Volker Schlöndorff enthuses about the Gdansk shipyards and his lead actress Katharina Thalbach. And it's curtains for the Deutsche dackel.
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Jan Philipp Reemtsma uses Dostoevsky to pull the wool from our eyes and expose the driving force of the Rote Armee Faktion to be megalomania and lust for violence. Peter Schneider for his part draws parallels between the RAF and al Qaida. Iranian feminist Mina Ahadi attacks tolerance of intolerance. The taz celebrates international women's day by debunking myths of men and women. And culture is the mop and bucket brigade of the Romanian economic renewal.
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Bulgarian writer Ilija Trojanow points out that the origins of Europe are outside Europe today. The FAZ maps out China's Marxist capitalist monitored pluralist paradox. An initiative has started up against David Chipperfield's "oversized aquarium" planned for Berlin's Museum Island. And the decision of the Bavarian State Library to join Google Book Search is a slap in the face to the Bibliotheque Nationale.
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Young Latvian conductor Andris Nelsons pirouetted through a futuristic Wagnerian Ring in Riga. On the fiftieth anniversary of her country's independence, Ghanian writer Amma Darko talks "HIPC" crossroads. Sigmar Polke's mysterious wurst has made a welcome return in Baden-Baden. And while the French see child raising pragmatically, German standards are so high, they don't have children at all.
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The SZ looks at the burgeoning Arab blog scene. The FAZ portrays Iranian political activist Mina Ahadi, who has set up a "Central Committee for Ex-Muslims". Ukrainian author Yuri Andrukhovych is disappointed with the big Austrian chill. And South America is talking with Eastern Europe is talking with Asia in the first edition of Documenta Magazine.
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Volker Schlöndorff's Solidarity film "Strajk" has come out in Poland. Director Andrzej Wajda defends the movie, saying no Pole could have made it. Anna Walentynowicz, who the story is based on, opposes it as fiercely as she once did the communists. "Good morning, you thieves and corrupt politicians," bellows the hugely popular Malian radio announcer "Dragon". And the FAZ turns its feuilleton over to the meteorologists.
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The Zeit explains that the political Left under Romano Prodi has been a great disappointment to Italy while the intellectual Left in France is backing conservative presidential candidate Nicolas Sarkozy. Historian Sir Ian Kershaw does not like to see the carpet bombing of Germany in World War Two set on a par with Nazi crimes. Ex-RAF terrorist Christian Klar sends a greeting from jail bemoaning the continued existence of international owner class. And sociologist Wolf Lepenies suggests that German universities wake up and smell the coffee of the Google era.
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