Bettina Baltschev

Bettina Baltschev was born in Berlin in 1973 and studied cultural studies, journalism and philosophy in Leipzig and Groningen. She is the executive director of the Saxon Literature Council, an author and editor at MDR, and commutes between Leipzig and her second home in Amsterdam. She has also stayed in Hamburg at the Hotel Wedina and has left us a dedication in her book “Am Rande der Glückseligkeit”.

About the book:
“As far as the eye can see”. The phrase must have originated on a North Sea beach – perhaps on Schiermonnikoog – so white, wide and empty it lies there, a magical, sometimes eerie no-man’s land where land and sea merge. Here Bettina Baltschev begins her journey to the beaches of Europe, to the edges of our continent. From eight beaches in eight countries, she takes excursions into the present and the history of a place of longing that is the last refuge for some. She makes excursions to literary figures and artists who have been inspired by the strange magic of the beach, observes the ever-changing landscapes and the people in them, and tells sometimes cheerfully, sometimes movingly, always lightly and elegantly of true and fictitious, happy and tragic fates on the beach. At the edge of our world.