Acting star in Graz

Caroline Peters: “Oh well, they all have fears”

(Bild: Rafaela Pröll)

Caroline Peters became a star as a member of the Vienna Burgtheater ensemble, as "Buhlschaft" in Salzburg and with TV series such as "Mord mit Aussicht". Now she has written her first novel, "Ein anderes Leben". She will read from it at the Schauspielhaus Graz on March 7. The "Krone" asked her for an interview in advance.

How did it come about that you, as a very successful actress, wrote a novel?
I've been working with texts, language and literature all my life. And I've always written, but only for myself in diaries. The phase of the pandemic, when I had little to do as an actress, awakened in me the desire to write something of my own.

As a theater actress, you have some of the greatest classics in your head. Does that help when you want to write something yourself? Or was that an obstacle?
I think it helps because you've been able to develop a great feeling for language. And a theater text is very different from a novel. A theater text is meant to be spoken, in space, with its own rhythm. A novel is meant to be read quietly in your head. That's why I didn't feel inhibited.

Caroline Peters

(Bild: Mirjam Knickriem)

How did you find the story for "Another Life"?
I had been thinking for a long time that I wanted to use the story of my mother and our family - the story of a family that fled the former Eastern territories and built something new in the West after the war. But the special thing about my mother, who was a literary scholar, is that she turned her attention to the East and the literature there at a time when West German life was completely focused on the West, on consumerism and the USA. That was very stubborn of her and I wanted to explore what it does to you when you do the opposite of what the majority around you are doing.

But it's not an autofictional book, or an autobiography of her mother, is it?
No, I invented a lot of it. I did follow the dates of my mother's life, but I also wanted to tell a story that goes beyond her. I wanted to show that my mother was not an isolated case. There were many strong women after 1945 who are told far too little about. And I also wanted to explore which daughters these women raised and how this story continues to be written generation after generation.

Caroline Peters, "Another Life" (Rowohlt, 240 pages, 23.40 euros)

(Bild: Rowohlt)

Your novel is a daughter's look back at her mother. Do you have the feeling that a lot has changed?
When I was younger, I used to think that each generation fought for something that would be preserved for the next. But that doesn't seem to be the case anymore. It always seems to go backwards and forwards. And that's why it was important to me to jump back and forth in time, to show that the present and the past are equally present. And even relatives who have been dead for a long time can reappear in one's life - as a character to work through. As a child or teenager, you often only see adults as people who are above you and look after you. But at some point you realize that they all have fears, worries and desires and you see them on the same level as yourself. To put it bluntly: the dead live on and your relationship with them continues to change even after their death. And I thought that was nice to describe.

Are there any plans for a next book?
I definitely want to continue writing. I found it very satisfying as a job - especially in comparison to my work as an actress, which is very much characterized by the collective. As an author, I can sit at my desk and rule over the characters myself or manage them. And I can develop my own linguistic images - that makes me very happy.