The Berlin-based author and playwright was born in the then-USSR and emigrated to Germany in 1995. ‘Glorious People’, their second novel, now translated into English, was longlisted for the German Book Prize and won several others. Salzmann has since been awarded the prestigious Kleist Prize for 2024, the biggest prize for literature in Germany. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Hello, this is Meet the Writers.
I'm Georgina Godwin.
My guest today is a German playwright, essayist, theatre curator and novelist.
The Berlin based writer was born in Volgograd in the then USSR and raised in Moscow until they were 10 when the family emigrated to Germany in 1995.
They're the author of three books and 11 plays.
Glorious People, their second novel, first published in German in 2021.
It was long listed for the German Book Prize.
It won the 2022 Literature Hauser Prize and the Heinrich Heine Prize and it's just been announced as the winner of the biggest prize in German literature and that's the Heinrich von Kleiss Prize.
Sasha Saltzman, welcome to Meet the Writers.
Thank you for having me.
I'm so delighted to be here.
Such an interesting life, Sasha.
And I'm so pleased that you're on a flying visit to London and we've managed just to catch up to talk about everything that your book is about because it very much intertwines with your life.
I think it was your life inspired the book and it's wonderful to be able to discuss your background.
You were born in the former ussr.
What do you remember of that?
You left when you were 10.
But being there in Volgograd as a small child, do you have any kind of clear reckon that's a valid question.
Because of course, as a writer and someone who is very much dedicated to writing down what you remember and understanding memory as also an archive, especially when your history is not part of the majority narrative.
I'm constantly trying to remember and also trying to divide memory from wishful thinking.