A literature festival evening in Munich brings together two themes: queer self-determination and civil disobedience. They are united by the courage to show themselves vulnerable.
A restaurant, a mother, an adult child. And the silence that spreads as the mother repeatedly confronts Selah with her displeasure. Clothing style, demeanour, life plan: they don’t fit into the narrow grid that her mother has designed for Selah’s life. She had given birth to a girl and had a boy. Why hasn’t Selah been married for a long time? The logical conclusion doesn’t occur to her.
“Seven Seconds of Air” by Luca Mael Milsch is one of the three works presented at the Muffatwerk under the motto “Self and Determined”. “Love is deeply political,” says Daniel Schreiber, Berlin author and curator of this year’s literature festival. Queer people have to stand up to a wave of hatred. This makes it all the more important to thematise their “language of love”.
This language is characterised by pauses and breaks. It leaves gaps and searches for words. Dealing with it needs to be learnt. The authors express the fact that their characters first have to redefine themselves. In Hengameh Yaghoobifarah’s novel “Schwindel”, for example, Delia, a non-binary person, finds a place of gender euphoria through her love for Ava. “Finding language can also mean finding worlds,” says Selma Kay Matter about her autofictional debut “Muscles of Plastic”.
These worlds can be confusing. Matter’s literary self, Kay, loses herself in an Ikea furniture store. A building in which everyone goes in one direction, which nobody can leave and in which the employees creepily seem to know exactly who Kay is. Struggles of reality, told in a surreal world.
The authors play with forms of expression, breaking out of literary conventions. “Queer people need a lot of imagination to reinvent themselves outside the system,” explains Milsch. According to Matter, they are already writing against resistance and have to take space.
The characters strive for the freedom to live a self-determined life. They embark on a risky journey of self-discovery, even if a character like Selah only “realises late on that she has a body that means something, for others, for herself”.
Later in the evening, Samira Akbarian, legal scholar and author of the book “Breaking the Law”, also spoke about the power of one’s own vulnerable body as a means of protest. Together with publicist Samira El Ouassil and author Friedemann Karig, she discussed civil disobedience.
The charges brought by the Munich Public Prosecutor General’s Office against five climate activists from the “Last Generation” provided fuel for the fire right at the start. According to Akbarian, this is a misinterpretation of the penal code: “Section 129 is not intended for political activists who stick to the streets. It is intended for mafia bosses.” A sit-in blockade is disruptive, but not violent. “It’s the job of protest to disrupt.”
She interprets civil disobedience as a language of love. It expresses loyalty to the constitution – even if it appears to violate individual laws. It’s a paradox: “Questioning democracy without questioning democracy.” Akbarian’s interpretation is not always met with approval. Science is strongly characterised by the idea of order, according to which no one is allowed to disregard the rules.
Yet such a vulnerable protest speaks for itself. Anyone who confronts police officers in full uniform in a summer dress is doing so for a good reason. Why haven’t right-wing extremists stuck to the streets yet? “Right-wingers can’t protest peacefully because their goals are not peaceful,” says Friedemann Karig.
When used correctly, civil disobedience is the contrasting agent that characterises a functioning democracy. Its value often becomes apparent in retrospect, as in the case of the American civil rights activist Martin Luther King, who only became an icon of peaceful resistance posthumously.
Akbarian herself says that, as an author, she does not have to stick to the streets to be heard. She calls for more commitment to democracy, be it through protest – or the power of the word.
This article was published first in German by Süddeutsche Zeitung and translated to English by GAY45.
– – –
GAY45 is committed to publishing a diversity of journalism, prose, and poetry. We’d like to hear your thoughts about this or any of our articles. And here’s our email if you want to send a letter: [email protected].
– – –
When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know.
– – –
Listen to our podcast ‘Gen Clash: Queer Perspectives on Current Affairs’ on your favourite podcast platform.
– – –
We appreciate it. Thanks for reading.
