About us

Focus: Polish 2025-2027 © © Goethe-Institut © Goethe-Institut

Litrix.de - Online Portal and Translation Programme
Special-focus language 2025 - 2027: Polish

Litrix.de presents new publications from the German book market which are selected by a jury of critics on a regular basis. Information on these books is provided on our portal in the form of

• book reviews by well-known literary critics,
• sample passages
• details on authors and publishers

in German, English and the current special-focus language.

Our goal is to provide an opportunity for interested readers, publishers and translators abroad to gain a direct, unmediated impression of the state of contemporary German literature.

What makes Litrix.de unique is its Translation Grant Programme, which focuses on a single language for several years at a time.

Previous special-focus languages:

2022 - 2024: Italian
2019 - 2021: Greek
2015 - 2018: Arabic
2012 - 2014: Russian
2009 - 2011: Spanish (Argentina)
2007 - 2008: Portuguese (Brazil)
2005 - 2006: Chinese
2004 - 2005: Arabic

2025 - 2027, Polish is our special-focus language.

We are accordingly presenting all our books in Polish as well as in German and English, and we offer targeted financial support for translations into Italian. Information about eligibility criteria can be found here.

The Litrix.de team

Dr. Anne-Bitt Gerecke

After gaining a doctorate in Modern German Literature Anne-Bitt Gerecke was charged by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (Federal Cultural Foundation) with devising and developing the translation support programme Litrix.de. Based in the Goethe-Institut’s Berlin office, she has been responsible for the Litrix programme since 2007. She is Acting Head of the Goethe-Institut’s ‘Literature and Translation Support’ section.

Anne-Bitt Gerecke © Andreas Teich / Goethe-Institut

Despina Kobothanassi

Despina Kobothanassi studied German as a Foreign Language and Computer Linguistics at the Aristotle University, Thessaloniki, and the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. She has worked at the Goethe-Institut’s headquarters in Munich since 2000, where she has been responsible since 2004 for the content management system and the multilingual web-presence of the Litrix.de literature portal.

Despina Kobothanassi © Loredana La Rocca

Anna Krischer

Anna Krischer studied Arts Management at the University for Arts and Culture in St Petersburg and has worked at the Goethe-Institut since 1998, first in St Petersburg and subsequently at the Institute’s headquarters in Munich, where her responsibilities include financial management and preparations for sittings of the Litrix jury.

Anna Krischer © Loredana La Rocca

Jan Göthlich

Jan Göthlich studied cultural economics and Latin American cultural studies in Passau, Santiago de Chile and Bonn. After working in the publishing industry, he has been working at the Goethe-Institut's head office for literature and translation promotion since 2021. Among other things, he sends out the Litrix.de newsletter.

Jan Göthlich © Loredana La Rocca

Elżbieta Jeleń

Elżbieta Jeleń has a degree in German studies and a postgraduate degree translation from the Jagiellonian University, works as Head of Library & Information at the Goethe-Institut Krakow and is responsible, among other things, for promoting literature and translation.

Elżbieta Jeleń © Adrian Pallasch

The Jury Process

Books featured on Litrix.de are selected by a panel of independent experts consisting of three well-known literary critics and two experts from the relevant special-focus language area familiar both with literature and with the practical realities of publishing. Each year, the jury chooses a list of approximately 20 newly published German-language books from the fields of fiction, non-fiction, and books for children and young people. These books are showcased on the Litrix.de website by means of sample passages and background material in German, English and the relevant special-focus language, and they are incorporated into the associated Translation Grant Programme. The selection process ensures that the books showcased on Litrix.de are well matched to the interests of those in the area chosen for special focus.

German-Polish Jury (2025-2027)

Jan Drees

Jan Drees is literary editor at Deutschlandfunk and presenter of the programme ‘Büchermarkt’. He is on the team of critics for the 3sat programme ‘Kulturzeit’, a member of various juries and the author of novels and non-fiction books such as ‘Staring at the Sun’ (2000), ‘Letzte Tage, jetzt’ (2011) ‘Sandbergs Liebe’ (2019) and ‘Literatur der Krise: Das Novellen-Werk von Hartmut Lange’ (2022). Jan Drees runs the blog lesenmitlinks.de.

Catherine Newmark

Catherine Newmark has a doctorate in philosophy, was a research assistant at the Institute of Philosophy at the Free University of Berlin and now works as a cultural journalist in Berlin. Among other things, she is editor for non-fiction in the humanities and philosophy at Deutschlandfunk Kultur and presenter of the philosophy programme ‘Sein und Streit’.

Sarah Wildeisen

Sarah Wildeisen was a bookseller before studying art history and German studies and writing reviews and articles about children's and young adult literature for national newspapers and specialist magazines. In 2013, she co-founded the ‘Düster + Heiter’ picture book festival in the German-Polish border region, which she still curates today. She is head of the children's and youth library at the Berlin Central and Regional Library.

Elżbieta Kalinowska

Elżbieta Kalinowska, translator, editor, publisher and cultural manager. She has been working as a literary translator since 2000 and has translated 40 books from German into Polish, including by the following authors Melinda Nadja Abonji, Zsuzsa Bank, Wolfgang Bauer, Sherko Fatah, Olga Grjasnowa, Elfriede Jelinek, Terezia Mora and Kim del'Horizon.
She was deputy director of the Polish Book Institute, where she was responsible for promoting reading in Poland and Polish literature abroad. She currently works as a non-fiction publisher at Grupa Wydawnicza Foksal. In 2012, she received the NRW Art Foundation Prize and in 2022 the Karl Dedecius Prize.

Marcin Wilk

Marcin Wilk - author, journalist, publicist, critic, curator of various literary programmes. Studied Polish Studies at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. At the Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences, he researches the social history of young women in the first half of the 20th century. He is the author of the literary blog „Wyliczanka“ and the following books: „Tyle słońca Anna Jantar. Biografia“, „Kwiatkowska. Żarty się skończyły“, „Pokój z widokiem. Lato 1939“ and „Lepszy gatunek. Psio-ludzkie historie“.