Rita Kuczynski

Rita Kuczynski is a German author, philosopher and editorialist.

Life

Rita Kuczynski was born in Neidenburg, Masuren. She grew up in East and West Berlin and studied music from 1956 to 1962. She undertook a master's in piano at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. From 1965 to 1970, she studied philosophy at the University of Leipzig and the University of Berlin. In 1971, she became an assistant at the Institute for Philosophy in the German Academy of Sciences at Berlin. In the following year, she married Thomas Kuczynski. She received the Promotion A from the Academy in 1975, with a doctorate on Hegel. From 1981 until 1990 she worked as a freelance writer.
In 1987, she became visiting professor for philosophy and literature at the University of Buffalo. She delivered lectures and papers at Columbia University, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Maryland, as well as the German Studies Association. After the upheavals of 1989 she separated from her husband. They were divorced in 1998. In 1991 she served as visiting professor for languages at the University of Chile. During work on a monograph about Gabriela Mistral she undertook research trips to Santiago de Chile, Concepción, La Serena, Vicuña and.
Since 1998 she has worked as an independent journalist and editorialist for the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Die Zeit, the Tagesspiegel, the Berliner Zeitung, DeutschlandRadio Berlin and Radio Bremen.
Her contributions to the discussion of German Reunification focus on the mutual understanding of East and West. She participated in the general discussion after reunification as a moderator in the DeutschlandRadio Berlin radio series Tacheles, in the Berlin Runde and in political features on DeutschlandRadio. She has participated in several television debates and talk shows on Germany unity.

Awards

Writers' Grant from the Senate of Berlin
Scholarship of the
Scholarship of the Berliner Künstlerförderung
Scholarship of the Council for European Studies
Scholarship of the University of Buffalo, Department for History and Department for Modern Languages and Literature
Literary scholarship of the
Writer at Johns Hopkins University, The American Institute for Contemporary German Studies, Washington D.C.
Literary award from China Time, Republic of China
Senior Fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies

Works

Fiction

1984 – Nächte mit Hegel. Lizenznummer 48-48/10/84.
1991 – Wenn ich kein Vogel wär..
1997 – staccato..
1999 – Mauerblume..
2001 – Die gefundene Frau..
2010 – Im Kreis..
2014 – Aber der Himmel war höher.

Non-fiction

1999 – DDR – Ende mit Wende ; with Stefan Moses, Harald Eggebrecht;.
2002 – Die Rache der Ostdeutschen ;.
2003 – Im Westen was Neues – Ostdeutsche auf dem Weg in die Normalität ;.
2005 – Ostdeutschland war nie etwas Natürliches – Deutschlandkenner aus Mittel- und Osteuropa, Frankreich, Großbritannien und den USA über das vereinte Deutschland ;.
2013 – Was glaubst du eigentlich? Weltsicht ohne Religion ;.

Radio features

Lacrimosa 1953 by Rita Kuczynski Radio-play: DS Kultur, 1988.Maria oder Eine namenlose Geschichte. Director: Günter Bormann. Producer: Rundfunk der DDR, 1984.Was ist ein Berg?. Literary feature about Chilean poet Gabriela Mistral. Director: Horst Liepach. Producer: DS Kultur, 1991.

Film

. Adaptation of Rita Kuczynski's novel, Wenn ich kein Vogel wär, 1991. Regie: Horst Seemann, Drehbuch: Rita Kuczynski/Horst Seemann

Essays

"Sich nicht zur Unzeit begegnen – Ein Feature". in Surviving the twentieth century; Social Philosophy from the Frankfurter School to the Columbia Faculty Seminars. Judith T. Marus editor Transaction Publishers. New Brunswick and London, 1999,, pp. 295–311
"Von der Stärke schwacher Bindungen – Essay – ". in Antoinette – Tarot der Europa; 1999,, S-50-55.
"Der Einstieg in den Ausstieg". in Wolf Biermann et al., Die Ausbürgerung. Anfang vom Ende der DDR. Fritz Pleitgen. Ullstein, Berlin 2001,, S. 148–151.