INTRODUCTION: SHARON DODUA OTOO – LITERATURE, POLITICS, POSSIBILITY

Abstract

Sharon Dodua Otoo is one of the most visible and influential writers currently working in Germany. She was awarded the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 2016 and the Medal of Merit of the city-state of Berlin (Verdienstorden des Landes Berlin) in 2022. Otoo came to prominence in the German-speaking world with her Bachmann-prizewinning short story ‘Herr Gröttrup setzt sich hin’, which has since been published in the original German alongside English translations and recently in a new German-language edition. Two novellas – The Things I am Thinking While Smiling Politely and Synchronicity – had appeared prior to that, both in Otoo’s original English and in German translations by Miriam Nuenning. Her first full-length novel, Adas Raum, appeared in the original German with S. Fischer in 2021. The novel was shortlisted for the Das Debut prize in 2021 and was one of NDR-Kultur’s best books of 2021. A Dutch-language translation appeared in 2022 and Japanese and English-language translations (as Ada’s Room in North America and Ada’s Realm in the UK) in 2023. Otoo’s international profile as a writer is reflected in residencies and honours outside Germany: she is a Visiting Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, and she was the Schröder Writer-in-Residence at the University of Cambridge in 2022 and the Max Kade Writer-in-Residence at Lafayette College, Easton, Pennsylvania in 2023.