"We the Animals"
Reading in English with the American author Justin Torres
On 2 July 2016 at 4 pm, Justin Torres will be telling an impressive story about growing up in difficult circumstances between love and violence at Chemnitz City Library. The reading in English will take place in the Central Library at TIETZ. Moritzstraße 20. Admission is free.
In the novel "We the Animals", three brothers struggle through their childhood: they throw tomatoes at each other, build kites out of rubbish bags, hide when their parents shout at each other, beat up their dad and mum when they laugh. The parents, only slightly older than their children, are from Brooklyn - he is Puerto Rican, she is white. Their love is a serious, dangerous thing that binds the family together, but also tears them apart time and again. It is loud and passionate in this household, the boys are always hungry and want more: more meat, more noise, more warmth, more life.
"We the Animals" explores the impetuous years of growing up - how strongly we are moulded by our first attachments and how we are ultimately hurled into our future at escape velocity.
Justin Torres is one of the most interesting young voices in contemporary American literature. He was born in 1980 and grew up in upstate New York. He has worked as a farm labourer, dog walker, bookseller and creative writing teacher. "We the Animals" is his first novel, which has been published in over a dozen countries worldwide and was honoured with the Cabell First Novelist Award. Justin Torres holds the Picador Professorship for Literature at Leipzig University in the 2016 summer semester.
The reading is a joint event organised by Chemnitz University of Technology/Professorship for American Studies, the US Consulate General in Leipzig and Chemnitz City Library.
For further information please contact:
Uwe Hastreiter
Chemnitz City Library, Public Relations
Telephone: 0371 488-4202
E-mail: hastreiter(at)stadtbibliothek-chemnitz.de
Elisa Lochen
TU Chemnitz/Professorship for American Studies
Phone: 0371 531 29683
E-mail: elisa.lochen(at)s2005.tu-chemnitz.de