Berit Glanz
Pixel Dancers

novel, new

256pp (55,200 words)

• English sample translation (PDF – 2,6 MB)
• About the Author

>> Friedrich Hebbel Prize

>> Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Literary Prize

>> Shortlisted for the aspekte Prize (best literary debut)

Elisabeth, known to everyone as Beta, works at a start-up: her everyday life is a whirl of pitches and teambuilding exercises, while in her scant free time she develops models of animals on 3D printers and eats her way through Berlin’s various ice-cream parlours.
When a stranger with the alias Toboggan contacts her via a peculiar app, it changes her life. His profile picture arouses her curiosity, but instead of an answer he sends her on a hunt for virtual clues. It leads Beta to the story of two artists, Lavinia and Walter, a couple in the 1920s who performed expressionist dance theatre wearing whole-body masks and broke with bourgeois convention. Instead of liberating them from social pressures, however, the story ends in tragedy – and Lavinia reaching for a weapon.

The more Beta learns about Lavinia, the more she comes to identify with her devotion to art and explores possible ways out, the more she longs to break free of her own superficial existence. A trip to Barcelona offers her and her team the unforeseen opportunity to transform technology into the absurd or even into art – and Beta seizes her chance.

Rights sold

book club – Büchergilde Gutenberg
film rights – optioned

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Reviews

»A sophisticated novel about how the subtle compulsion of the creative working world turns even resistance into support of the system.«
Insa Wilke, Süddeutsche Zeitung

»Seemingly effortlessly, Berit Glanz combines the two worlds and demonstrates what we can learn and experience from the past, from old books and costumes, old dreams and old strategies. Brilliant and encouraging.«
Volker Weidermann, Spiegel online

»Berit Glanz brings together the ›pixels‹ of the digital age and the ›dancers‹ of the Weimar Republic in a gesture of refusal that is simply amazing.«
Julia Encke, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung

»Berit Glanz goes beyond the scope of the classical novel, linking her text to the virtual world.«
Marlen Hobrack, der Freitag

»One of the most interesting new books of this season. (...) A cleverly composed, fascinating debut.«
Oliver Pfohlmann, Der Tagesspiegel

»Glanz writes about the wonderful side of the internet, about its endless possibilities of immersion and educatation. (...) A most significant contribution to the genre of the quasidystopic contemporary novel.«
Jan Jekal, die tageszeitung

»PIXEL DANCERS links contemporary art with the artists of the Weimar Republic.«
Cornelia Geißler, Berliner Zeitung

»A fascinating first novel celebrating the absurd and erratic element in the past and present. (...) Superb.«
Katharina Manzke, BücherMagazin

»PIXEL DANCERS is more than an exciting Google and Wikipedia search, it looks for opportunities for rebellion. (…) A funny and intelligent new voice in literature.«
Sine Wiegers, NDR Kulturjournal (TV)

»Here´s an author who tries something truly new. (...) Witty, surprising, entertaining.«
Insa Wilke, WDR3 Gutenbergs Welt