Carolin Emcke and Teju Cole

Two of the most important intellectuals in conversation about the most urgent questions of our time.

Carolin Emcke, born in 1967, studied philosophy in London, Frankfurt/Main and Harvard. She wrote her doctorate on the concept of "collective identities" and is the winner of the 2016 Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. The author has
reported for many years for SPIEGEL and DIE ZEIT from war and crisis zones and has dealt with questions of desire, violence and justice in numerous books. Today, more than ever, her diagnoses of the times are of disturbing topicality. With this wealth of experience behind her, how does she look at the present?

Teju Cole, born in 1975, grew up in Nigeria and came to the United States as a teenager. He teaches at Bard College and is the photography critic for The New York Times Magazine. His photographic work is exhibited internationally, currently at Zurich's Strauhof (June 8-Sept. 29, 2018). His books Open City and Every Day is for the Thief are considered outstanding works of recent American literature.