Bad Aussee.
For many holidaymakers, a good book is a way to switch off. At literary hotels, this aspect is a central part of the concept: including libraries, readings and advice on everything to do with reading.
The Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph gave the impetus for the first literary hotel in the spa town of Bad Aussee – at least indirectly. Because his annual summer resort around 1900 in the Salzkammergut developed a magnetic effect far beyond the court and nobility.
Composers, actors and writers were drawn to the mountains and lakes on the northern edge of the Austrian Alps. They left poems, and their fee at the inn.
For example in “Die Wasnerin”, originally a restaurant for the workers on the “Wasen” (the meadows), later an artists’ meeting place and today a hotel with a special focus: With poetry readings, workshops and the house library, the operators want to tie in with the artistic traditions.
Literature evenings and reading recommendations
Even a literary scholar is employed in the hotel. Daniela Vergud describes her job as follows: “I do the introductions to the readings, give literature evenings and recommendations for reading.”
Once a year it is particularly in demand, when the “Literakult” event is on the hotel programme. A weekend with readings in special locations, scenic performances and music. Even a Nobel Prize winner in literature was supposed to come, but Corona thwarted the plans.
The demands are high, as are the costs for the organizers. They only get part of it back through the package prices, even if the event is always fully booked, as Vergud says: “We are mainly addressing regular guests who are interested in literature.”
A concept with a lot of effort
“Literature Hotel” is not a protected term. Theoretically, any house with a more or less well-kept library can call itself that. However, this is too weak as a unique selling proposition.
Even services such as knitted reading socks or the wish book to take home, which some houses advertised in the past, were not always enough – especially not to overcome the consequences of the pandemic and inflation.
“We can see that the smaller hotels in particular are tending to leave the market,” says Tobias Warnecke, Managing Director of the German Hotel Association (IHA). They are being replaced by large chains that place more value on design than on an individual guest program.
From the point of view of the industry association, two trends are causing problems for the literary hotels: on the one hand the development on the book market, on the other hand the shortage of skilled workers. “In the hotel industry, we are currently grateful for every employee we can get,” says Warnecke.
To find staff with a literary background as sparring partners for the guests is nothing short of a miracle, says Warnecke. However, from the point of view of the managing director, it is part of the catalog of criteria for a literary hotel. As well as recurring readings and thus cooperation programs with publishers or bookstores.
But that’s a lot of effort for the hotels, which only pays off with a more upscale clientele, Warnecke suspects, and this brings him to the second stumbling block: “The topic can also catch on with young people, but more as a backdrop.”
demarcation to other houses
Younger hotel visitors appreciate the ambience of an old library, but prefer to use their tablets in their reading chairs rather than their books. They are therefore less willing to pay extra for the service. The number of young guests in the hotel is manageable, confirms Daniela Vergud from “Die Wasnerin”.
Whereby the house in Bad Aussee deliberately excludes families as a target group, but in addition to literature it also offers a focus on yoga and wellness and calls itself the “Healthy & Nature Hotel”.
Literature is a niche and a hobby, admits Vergud, who is also responsible for the hotel’s press work: “It’s not a topic that yields economic profits.” But, she says, the positioning helps to distinguish it from other hotels.
Luxury and literature go hand in hand
The combination of wellness and readings is quite common. Luxury and literature seem to go hand in hand here. The Berlin journalist Barbara Schaefer, for example, has compiled hotels around the world as the setting for novels, the residence of well-known authors or hoards of literature: 95 percent of them are luxury hotels.
Among them are the Hotel Budersand on Sylt, where Elke Heidenreich has set up a library. Or the “Adlon” in Berlin, where not only Nobel Prize winners stayed, but also where the concept of “Writer in Residence” was invented: the Viennese essayist Anton Kuh (1890 – 1941) was allowed to live and write in the Adlon for months free of charge.
Such an artist scholarship through a hotel is financed by its guests as well as a possible reading program – whether they use the offers or not.
Culture in the hotel of the G7 summit
In the “Elmau Castle” in Upper Bavaria – probably still known to many because of the two G7 summits in 2015 and 2022 – around a quarter of the cultural events offered fall into the literature category. And thus in the area of responsibility of the literature program manager Martin Lau, who also looks after the in-house bookshop.
“Dietmar Müller-Elmau runs the hotel in order to be able to afford the culture – and not the other way around,” says Lau, looking at the lord of the castle and hotel manager.
Lau doesn’t have any trouble finding current topics and new publications: “Lots of authors apply,” he says.
There is no performance fee. The fee is three days in the castle, with half board.
(dpa)
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