Life and Work

At the age of five years Ann Cotten was taken by her parents, who are both biochemists, to Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

, where they went for work.
There she finished university in 2006 with a work about Concrete Poetry

Concrete poetry

Concrete poetry or shape poetry is poetry in which the typographical arrangement of words is as important in conveying the intended effect as the conventional elements of the poem, such as meaning of words, rhythm, rhyme and so on....

. At the same time she first emerged as a poet at poetry slams. In 2007 Cotten, whose work has been published in anthologies and journals for poetry, succeeded as a writer with her first book, Fremdwörterbuchsonnette, which was published at Suhrkamp. Her latest book with Suhrkamp is Florida-Räume Some of her poems have been translated into English and published in journals like burning deck (USA). In 2010 Cotten colloborated with visual artist Kerstin Cmelka in a book called I, Coleoptile. Original English poetry and film stills, the book was published by Broken Dimanche Press.

Cotten grew up as a Viennese girl, nevertheless there is a remarkable idiom in her writings including lots of English allusions.

Ann Cotten lives in Vienna and in Berlin.

Publications

• Fremdwörterbuchsonette, poetry, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt/Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-518-12497-0.
• Nach der Welt. Die Listen der konkreten Poesie und ihre Folgen., essay, Klever, Vienna 2008, ISBN 978-3-902665-01-0.
• Glossarattrappen, prose, AusnahmeVerlag, Hamburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-940992-09-3.
• Das Pferd. SuKuLTuR, Berlin 2009 (Schöner Lesen Nr. 84), ISBN 978-3-941592-03-2.
• Florida-Räume, poetry, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt/Main 2010, ISBN 978-3-518-42132-1.
• I, Coleoptile, poetry (English), Broken Dimanche Press, Berlin-Oslo-Dublin 2010, ISBN 978-3-00-032627-1

Honors

• 2008: George-Saiko-Reisestipendium
• 2008: Clemens-Brentano-Preis
• 2007: Reinhard-Priessnitz-Preis

External links

• Review of I,Coleoptile in English from De Reactor
• Article on the book Florida-Räume in the German weekly news magazine Die Zeit
  Die Zeit
  Die Zeit is a German nationwide weekly newspaper that is highly respected for its quality journalism.With a circulation of 488,036 and an estimated readership of slightly above 2 million, it is the most widely read German weekly newspaper...
  
  
• Webpage for Ann Cotten English book
• Interview in English with Ann Cotten at 3AM Magazine
• review of the English translation
• Ann Cotten on the website of Suhrkamp-publishing (german)
• Entry at Poetry International Web