Last night, as part of the Soho in Ottakring Festival the Wientouristinnen (Carina, Ju and Petra) strutted their stuff together with German poet,
Augusta Laar.
It all had to do with Pamphlet, still somewhat derided in the German-speaking world as compared with the pamphlets and home-made chapbooks more prevalent in the English-speaking one. It was fitting that the gig took place in the Weinhaus Sittl, a traditional Viennese Gasthaus where the background noise was part of the performance. The Viennese Gasthaus has a long tradition as a place of discussion and dissent of the type presented in pamphlets.
After an introduction to historical information on the women’s movement in Vienna (1848 – 1918) with audience participating in reading key texts, the four women 
poets then read from their work. Afterwards there was a read-in with contributions by a couple of male poets. Politics and freedom of expression, telling things as they were and are through poetry and prose and a video projected on the ceiling with men reading women’s texts and translation boards carried round the Gasthaus made for a lively and stimulating atmosphere; and all the while, the Wirt of the Gasthaus emptied spent plates into a passage behind a small door in the wall, no doubt to avoid 
disturbing the happenings.
