Published October 29th, 2019
Other
by Lisa Schantl
Tint Journal hosted its first public reading – and it was the liveliest celebration of non-native English writing the world has ever seen.
Graz, Austria – On Wednesday, October 23rd, 2019, at 7.30 pm the Unicafe Campus, a trendy café in the midst of the University of Graz’ campus, opened its doors for a special occasion: Tint Journal’s first public reading event ever was about to happen. Six writers – five had been published in Tint Journal before and one had signed up for the open list slot – performed their short stories, flash pieces and poems in front of the most engaging audience. They were accompanied by the wonderful acoustic tunes of singer-songwriter Dear Waves, a local musician.
After Tint’s voluntary team had rearranged the café into the perfect reading location, placed tinted programs on the tables, sound-checked the writers and prepared the entrance area with tinted bookmarks, the guests of this night’s reading event sprawled into the venue. They came in great numbers for the first public English literary reading hosted by Tint Journal, the magazine dedicated to publishing non-native English writers based in Graz, Austria. The place filled up quickly and quite soon no single chair remained vacant.
Mathias Kaiser alias Dear Waves opened the reading with two songs and set the mood for the following part. Lisa Schantl, Tint Journal’s founder and editor-in-chief, welcomed the audience and introduced them to Tint. She presented Tint’s vision and mission to become a hub for ESL and foreign language writers. Also, Tint had become an official non-profit organization recently, a development worth celebrating at this occasion, too.
The reading performances themselves were organized in two rounds. In the first round Filippo Bagnasco from Italy took the audience with him down to Africa where they were confronted with a thrilling turning point of his short story “Down in Africa” (published in Tint Fall ’19); Daniela Rafalt from Austria drew the most melancholic picture of Syria with her poem “To my Syrian friend” (published in Tint Spring ’19) and premiered her poem “Pond’ring”; and Martina Braunegger from Austria explained the desperate longing of a snowman for spring with her flash fiction story “Spring Must Be Nice” (published in Tint Spring ’19).
In the break, the audience had the chance to meet the writers and chat with the organizing team. Pumped by the smiling faces of the crowd and positive feedback, Lisa Schantl opened the second round of performances after a brief musical intermission by Dear Waves.
The open list writer, Bianca Cosar, from Romania began this round with her poems “Sometimes”, “Violent Blue” and “Content Loading” and captured the audience immediately with her witty and deeply honest words. Then, Melania Paszek from Poland turned herself into a cat witnessing something no cat should ever witness with her short story “A Point of Mew” (published in Tint Spring ’19). The last performer of the evening was Philip Steiner from Austria. He closed the performances with the post-apocalyptic scenery of his two-part short story “Shadows over Jerusalem” (published in Tint Spring ’19 and Tint Fall ’19).
The final tunes of Dear Waves mixed with the chatter of the mingling crowd, who continued to celebrate non-native English writing in the café long after the official part had ended. A true festival of creative writing in English.
Tint Journal wants to thank all performers, volunteers, helping hands, the musician Dear Waves, the staff of Unicafe, the student organizations ÖH Uni Graz and StV Anglistik/Amerikanistik, and all guests for the great success of this event. Keep a little tint in your hearts and on your minds, and #showyourtint
Nationality: Austrian
First Language(s): German
Second Language(s):
English,
French,
Spanish
Supported by:
