The female face of prehistory | Meeting around Ulla Lust's comic “Woman as a Man”

Ulla Lust's Woman as Man, a book translated by Małgorzata Słabickie-Turpeyen in Poland by Kultura Gniewu, is a monumental non-fiction work that has been awarded the prestigious Deutscher Sachbuchpreis (2025), the most important prize for German-language non-fiction. In the conversation about comics, which transcends the boundaries of its genre and at the same time breaks stereotypes about the knowledge about the origins of humanity, we will touch on the issues of the contemporary view of prehistory, as well as the new forms and language of communication resulting from this perspective of the new science. Together with the translator, we will examine the world presented by the Austrian cartoonist, in which survival was possible only thanks to the egalitarian cooperation of women, men, children and non-normative people, performing diverse and meaningful roles for the community. Drawing on the latest advances in prehistoric science, Woman as Man illuminates the crucial role that empathy and cooperation have played in the development of humanity—traits that are not so much feminine as universal. During the meeting we will also look at selected aspects of translation work, typical of this literary convention.

Born in Vienna in 1967, Ulla Lust's work includes autobiographical, documentary and essay comics. Her autobiographical graphic novel Heute ist der letzte Tag vom Rest deines Lebens (Today is the Last Day of the Rest of Your Life) won wide acclaim, including the Los Angeles Times Book Award and the Ignatz Award. Ulli Lust teaches drawing and comics at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Hannover. English translation of the book Woman as a Man. At the dawn of history, it was realized with the support of the Goethe Institute as part of the Litrix.de program. The organizers of the event are the Lower Silesian Public Library and the Goethe Institute, and its partner is Kultura Gniewu publishing house.