Wladimir Kaminer

In collaboration with the German Library in The Hague, BorderKitchen presents on 2 December: a meeting with Wladimir Kaminer.

Kaminer was born in Moscow in 1967 and moved to the former East Germany in 1990, where, thanks to German reunification, he received an unrestricted residence permit. In Berlin he launched his famous “Russendisko,” a biweekly night at Kaffe Burger where he energised his new home city with Eastern European music. He made his literary debut in 2000 with the short story collection Russendisko, which became a major success in Germany and also attracted considerable international attention. Since then, he has published several collections of stories and novels, in which his Russian background is almost always present. In addition to Russendisko, Military Music and The Journey to Trulala have been translated into Dutch. Soon another collection will follow: There Was No Sex in Socialism.

In Sex Did Not Exist in the Soviet Union, Wladimir Kaminer looks back with a gently satirical eye on everyday life in his former homeland. Whether it was buying a new car, hunting for bargain deals on land turtles from Kazakhstan, or celebrating the Day of Spaceflight with dangerously improvised fireworks, life in the Soviet Union was full of surprises and often bizarre adventures. One thing is certain: anyone who enjoyed Jelle Brandt Corstius’s engaging television series about Russia will also find much to appreciate in Kaminer’s work.

On the occasion of Sex Did Not Exist in the Soviet Union, Wladimir Kaminer will be a guest at BorderKitchen. He will be interviewed by Daria Bouwman (in German).

Location: Weimarstraat 36, The Hague. Start time: 8:00 PM.