Hermann film.

They're making Judith Hermann's book Nichts als Gespenster into a film:
http://www.kino-zeit.de/filme/artikel/7920_nichts-als-gespenster.html
I think this will be good for her international readership and having her books translated into more langauges, even if the film is so-la-la.

I knew that filmmakers had been a large part of the latest Frankfurter Buchmesse-- many were invited and showed up, but had not expected such snappy results.

I've been trying to imagine how the film will work, there are some fabulous landscapes/settings in her book, I wonder if it will have any sort of traveloguey-element. Also, I wonder if they will also attempt to gear it in any way towards U.S. audiences, obviously many literary references will then fall through the cracks. I want to see the special effects, though. Eric Rentschler did a book I want to read all about literature as turned/translated into film. I wonder how many more authors are writing these days with an eye to having their books turned into films, and customizing their work in some ways for that, I imagine that transforming a novel into a film script is quite a task.

I'm excited to give some of the literature I've been exposed to a second, more leisurely reading. My first time through some Stifter, I was in Berlin and have these memories of trying to read Bunte Steine while on the u-bahn schuttling around the city to teach and in turmoil, etc. The prof seemed great and just taking part in a German seminar was quite exciting, and I loved the feeling that really blended in on my way to Dahlem, but at that point I was still taking notes and then going home to look up some words. I've been trying to find my syllabus from that in my files. Now they've built an enormous new egg-shaped library at the FU there, which I'd like to see at some point. Anyway, doing a few pieces again was great.