Chrischa Venus Oswald
At the beginning there was...
... the despair of my parents.
I've always loved telling stories. And whenever Christmas or my birthday came up, my mother sighed, because one thing was on my wish list above all: books. Books. Books. Mostly even volumes of poetry...
I loved poetry and so I read poetry, tried to write poetry, wrote poetry, read poetry, wrote poetry, tried to write poetry...
At some point I began to write longer texts. One of my short stories ("Die Obsession") was shortlisted for the Austrian "FM4 Wortlaut" award in 2009.
And at some point I actually dared to write a novel... (which I'm currently editing before I´ll try my luck with it).
In other words: books, reading and writing have been my passion ever since (and have often saved me).
Besides my personal, creative writing, I've worked as a freelancer in many language-related jobs (from translating a Bollywood magazine into German to interviewing creatives and writing for fancy design catalogues).
Since – with the exception of a few appearances at the Poetry Slam and participation in the 1st official Ö-Slam – I invested my time and energy mainly in my artistic work and exhibition activities when I started my art studies, writing led a shadowy existence for many years: In the Sense that I did not go public with it. Because I kept writing... It wouldn't have been any other way.
Why am I writing?
Firstly, because I could not not do it. Because the words seek their way out...
But I don't just write for myself:
My goals as a writer are to inspire others to see the potential and possibilities of our imagination, to discover the beauty in the ordinary, to teach others that they are not alone in their struggles as we all share this human experience in its absurdity and... go through beauty.
I want to get others to be more mindful and conscious through life and to discover the richness in their experiences, I want to sharpen their sensitivity, and I wish that in the moments when they are immersed in my writing, they will reconnect with theirs feelings, and connect with her sensual self.
I hope that one or the other can see life with different eyes and maybe discover something valuable.
I wish my readers would be able to wonder when I question their notion of "normal" or "reality".
I want to connect with the people who read what I write, not just intellectually, but emotionally as well.
I don't want them to be quite the same after reading my words - be it because I touched them, inspired them, encouraged them, because one or the other started to dream again or because of the power of language, of power became aware of creativity again.
Writing has saved me many times, and I hope reading can do the same for others.
I want to open up worlds and give people the opportunity to find what they need the moment they stumble across my lyrics.
If any of this succeeds, then I'm happy.
Where can you find my texts?
There are documents about documents on my computer. Documents full of completed poems, great poems, failed poems, poems in progress, ideas, short stories, short story beginnings, in English, in German, in Portuguese...
There are a lot of drafts in my email, in the Notes app on my phone, where I save whatever I feel worthy of typing at certain moments. And of course some things also find their way onto paper, handwritten or printed. I write my shopping lists on the back of poems. Yes, that's how it is.
Some poems are hanging around in virtual space, on my abandoned tumblr or here on this website, on my social media profiles... Some poems have been published on literary websites, in magazines or in my own books or artist zines.
Some of what I have written has found its way through my body and my mouth, I have spoken and recorded a few texts so that it is possible for others to hear or see me when I read - because it It is also important to me to give the word a body.
Links will follow.
