Symposium on Grief

Symposium on Grief and Literature: Friday 30 October 2026, 10:00–15:00, Foreningen Kunst og Mental Sundhed, Copenhagen. Admission is free.

Sorgens Stemmer is a free symposium on grief and literature taking place Friday, 30 October 2026 in Kirkesalen, Hans Bogbinders Allé 3, 2300 Copenhagen. The event is organized by Forlaget Arabesk in collaboration with the National Centre for Art and Mental Health and the National Grief Centre, supported by Velliv Foreningen.

The day explores the question: what can literary and aesthetic form do with grief that direct narrative cannot? Three books form the foundation - Terminal, Du griner mere end jeg husker, and Tænk ikke på mig - and the programme moves from personal and literary experience through grief research to practical writing exercises.

Programme:

10.00-10.30 · Coffee and welcome with Birgit Bundesen and Kristian Himmelstrup

10.30-11.00 · Two literary works on grief: Terminal presented and read by Hanne Kvist, illustrator and friend of author Annemarie Jeppesen. Du griner mere end jeg husker presented and read by editor Kristian Himmelstrup.

11.00-11.40 · The phenomenology of grief with Allan Køster - an introduction to how grief transforms our experience of ourselves, the other, and the world around us.

11.40-12.00 · Reading by Vilma Sandnes Johansson from the novel Tænk ikke på mig, which depicts the years surrounding a mother's terminal cancer from the perspective of her family.

12.00-12.45 · Lunch and informal socializing

12.45-13.10 · Grief as literary and aesthetic experience with Birgit Bundesen - perspectives on Danish and Nordic literature and the aesthetic strategies authors have used to give form to grief, illness, and loss.

13.10-13.50 · Panel discussion: What can literature do with grief? with Allan Køster, Vilma Sandnes Johansson, and Birgit Bundesen. The discussion opens for questions from the audience.

13.50-14.00 · Coffee break

14.00-14.15 · Reading by Anna Rieder - poems on love, illness, encounters with psychiatry, and the loss and gradual recovery of language.

14.15-15.00 · From grief to literature with Trisse Gejl and Birgit Bundesen - presentation