What we’re about
The Reader Berlin is a platform for writers of all nationalities, offering community, networking and author services.
Since 2011, we’ve been hosting creative writing workshops, seminars, literary events, and author get-togethers. Our tutors are award-winning authors and publishing professionals who offer expert insight, advice and encouragement to emerging writers. In the past few years, we’ve worked with hundreds of participants from all over the world, many of whom have gone on to publish work of their own. If you’ve never written a story before, come and have a go. If writing is everything to you, then we’d very much like to meet you too. We take it – but not ourselves – seriously.
Don't forget - to reserve a place on one of our workshops, you need to email hello@thereaderberlin.com, RSVPing on Meet Up is not enough!
Berlin is our home and we’re very much part of the international community of writers here. Writing can be joyous but it is solitary; we aim to bring writers together, to share contacts and build bridges to the publishing industry. Alongside readings and our programme of courses, we offer one-to-one mentoring, manuscript assessment, and editing services. Our tutors have taught in MFA programmes, publish books, write for international publications, and contribute to journals and magazines; their guidance and experience is invaluable.
We work with all kinds of writers – from those just starting out to published authors. Our alumni have won awards, started their own magazines, been published in print and online, gone on to undertake Creative Writing MAs and MFAs, and won publishing deals with major publishing houses.
What started life as a single workshop in the cellar of a Kreuzberg bookshop has evolved to encompass The Berlin Writing Prize, Writing Retreats on the Pelion peninsula in Greece, a series of print anthologies and a writers’ festival. At the heart of what we do is the belief that writers can and should help one another, and that with one another’s support we can become better writers.
Check out the testimonials from our participants here.
Upcoming events (4+)
See all- Flash Fiction Factory: in-person with Michael Jeffrey LeeMetis Books and Café, Berlin€240.00
***RSVP-ing to this event does not secure your spot!
*** Email hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up.***https://www.thereaderberlin.com/the-flash-fiction-factory-2/
Course tutor: Michael Jeffrey Lee
When: Tuesdays, 19:00-21:30
Starting date: September 16, 2025
Where: Metis Books and Café, Gleimstrasse 21, 10437 Berlin
Number of sessions: 7
Maximum participants: 10
Cost: €240A workshop dedicated to short-short prose of any kind: flash fiction, lyric essay, parable, fairy tale, dialogue, mini-play, whatever. The pace is brisk and the energy frenetic: you’ll be workshopped 3 times over the course of the 7-week class. No written feedback on the manuscripts themselves but expect generous, in-depth discussions of your work. Perfect for those looking to experiment with style, form, and voice—pure beginners, old hands, and the semi-seasoned all welcome.
Email us at hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up!
MICHAEL JEFFREY LEE’s first collection, Something in My Eye, received the Mary McCarthy Prize and was published by Sarabande. His second collection, My Worst Ideas, is forthcoming in 2023 from Spurl Editions. His stories have appeared in N+1, BOMB, The Rupture, and The Southern Review, among others. He has taught fiction at Tulane University, the University of Louisiana, and New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA). He was the recipient of the Yale Educator Award for his work at NOCCA, and a research fellowship from the Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Europa, Berlin. He is also the vocalist for Budokan Boys.
TESTIMONIALS:
Michael’s workshop was a shot in the arm! Inspiring, wide-ranging, serious fun. Highly Recommended!
—Christopher Chambers, author of Kind of Blue. - Novel Writing workshop (online) with Celina BasraLink visible for attendees€230.00
***RSVP-ing to this event does not secure your spot!
*** Email hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up.***https://www.thereaderberlin.com/novel-writing-workshop/
Course tutor: Celina Basra
When: Monday 18:00-20:00
Starting date: Sept 29, 2025
Where: online
Number of sessions: 6
Maximum participants: 12
Cost: €230A six week, two-hour virtual generative writing workshop to propel your novel along. Each week we will cover a different aspect of how to build a novel. Students will discuss different forms and techniques, and will be given writing prompts. We will workshop weekly submissions, work on the anatomy of your novel and write together. Open to any writer working on a novel, whichever stage. Non-native English speakers are very welcome.
Email hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up.
We will read Zadie Smith, Olga Ravn, Carmen Maria Machado, Italo Calvino, Sandra Cisneros, Toni Morrison, George Perec, Ibtisam Azem, and others, and look beyond literature for inspiration too, with excursions into film, art, architecture, music and nature. Bring your draft and let it soar.
Celina Baljeet Basra is a writer, curator, and art historian, based in Berlin. She published her debut novel HAPPY with Astra House, New York, in 2023 (New York Times Editor’s Pick). Celina has graduated in Art History in a Global Context, and has since worked as the curator of the art space Galerie im Turm, at Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien, and with Berlin Biennale. She is a founder of the curatorial collective The Department of Love, who recently commissioned the text-based Love Letter series inviting Sheena Patel, Priya Jay and Quinn Latimer, amongst others. Celina has been awarded residencies with the Shanghai Biennale and Kochi Biennale, and she has received both curatorial and literary research stipends of the Berlin senate. She is part of several juries for public art funding, and appointed member of the Berlin Atelierbeirat. She is currently working with Talking Objects Lab and Spore Initiative, amongst others, and is working on her second novel.
TESTIMONIALS:
Celina’s course offers a brilliant opportunity to explore the essential elements of writing a novel and take a dive deep into your own writing. While analysing the mechanics of successful first novels, writers investigate their own work in progress and elements of their book’s structure, characters, plot and tone. Celina is a thoughtful teacher, her feedback is insightful and encouraging, and the workshopping portion helps build a precious community of peers that can stay with you as you develop on your writing journey.
— Angela Sangma Francisl - Embodied Practice: A Creative Writing Workshop with Saskia VogelNeeds location€275.00
***RSVP-ing to this event does not secure your spot!
*** Email hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up!***https://www.thereaderberlin.com/embodied-practice-a-creative-writing-workshop/
Course tutor: Saskia Vogel
When: Mondays, 19:00-21:00
Starting date: October 13, 2025
Where: Prenzlauer Berg, (near U Eberswalder St)
Number of sessions: 7
Maximum participants: 12
Cost: €275### What is embodiment in writing and practice? What does being a writer mean in the day to day? Suitable for writers of prose and poetry at all levels, this 7-week workshop will support and nurture your creative practice as a whole, while working towards the completion of one piece of writing. Throughout the course, we’ll read and discuss essays and fiction by authors such as Melissa Febos, Brian Lin, and Clarice Lispector, allowing us to apply new ideas to in-class writing exercises and discussions aimed at building your writing craft.
From the get-go we’ll be workshopping each other’s pieces as Saskia facilitates constructive conversation about your work, looking in particular at what it is that moves the reader through a text. This workshop will be a supportive framework within which you can examine your relationship to writing while also receiving feedback from Saskia and the group on your project. There will be an attentiveness to style and relationality, questions of embodiment in writing, and ultimately connecting you to your creativity and sense of purpose as a writer and artist.
As the co-creator and deputy editor of the Erotic Review, a writer, and literary translator, Saskia is uniquely equipped to help you think holistically about the push and pull between writing and the way you inhabit the world, a relationship ultimately based in desire, that raw directional current of energy in your storytelling and creative practice. As you work on your project throughout the course, you will foster an open dialogue with yourself through the creative practice of writingEmail us at hello@thereaderberlin.com to sign up!
Saskia Vogel is an American-Swedish multi-award winning writer and translator as well as the co-creator and deputy editor of the Erotic Review, a platform for art and literature that explores humanity through the lens of desire. Previously Princeton University’s Translator in Residence and a finalist for the National Book Award, she has published work in The Observer, The New York Times, Granta, The White Review, The New Yorker, the Paris Review, among other publications. She has hosted workshops on translation, writing, and the editing process.
