Jane Flett

Jane Flett is a Scottish author based in Berlin. She is represented by Marina de Pass of the Soho Agency (UK) and Alexis Hurley of Inkwell Management (US). 

Her fiction has been commissioned for BBC Radio 4, Highly Commended in the Bridport Prize, and featured in Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading. She’s the author of the poetry chapbooks Quick, to the Hothouse (Dancing Girl Press) and Mashnotes (Pitymilk Press), and her work has been anthologised in the Best British Poetry.

Jane has been awarded residencies at Can Serrat, Fondation OBRAS, Villa Sarkia, Zvona i Nari, Moniak Mhor, and the New Orleans Writing Residency. She has performed her work widely at festivals and on the radio, including Edinburgh International Book Festival, Berlin Poesie, Berlin Stadtsprachen, and the Oxford Literary Fringe. In 2020, Jane was a recipient of the Berlin Senate Stipend for non-German literature.

Jane is also one half of the riot grrrl band Razor Cunts, a founder of Queer Stories Berlin, and a creative writing tutor for The Reader Berlin.

What brought you to Berlin? Love? World politics? Or was it a coincidence?

A desire to flee the hell-hole that is London and the way Tempelhof allotments look at sunset.

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What do you love about Berlin?

Turkish vegetable markets, queerness everywhere, naked lake swimming & saunas.

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What do you miss in Berlin?

I used to miss cheddar cheese, but now they have that in Lidl, and ale, but now they have that in Real, so the only thing left is various lovely people living in far-away places. I'm sure they'll show up in certain produce aisles soon.

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What is your favorite spot in Berlin?

The south runway of Tempelhof, with rollerskates on.

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Would you say you are a different person in Berlin? A different translator? And if yes, in what way?

No. But I do have more time and am surrounded by more people making the art they want to make, which has let me be more of myself.

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Which existing literary work do you wish you had written?

Melissa Broder's poetry collection "Meat Heart" or Barbara Gowdy's short story collection "We So Seldom Look on Love".

AWARDS & ACHIEVEMENTS

Die Stadt Der Anderen participant, KOOK, November 2017
Berlin’s English-language Writer of the Year, Indieberlin, December 2015
Top 50 short fictions of 2014, wigleaf, January 2015
New Year, New Writers, BBC Radio 4, January 2012
SLS-Disquiet Literary Award, shortlisted, Summer Literary Seminars, July 2012
Best British Poetry, Salt Publishing, October 2012
Scottish Book Trust New Writer Award, January 2009

RESIDENCIES

Fondation OBRAS, Portugal, May 2019
Can Serrat, Spain, May 2018
Moniack Mhor, Scotland, March 2018
New Orleans Writers Residency, USA, January 2018
Zvona i Nari, Croatia, August 2017