A novel for the 60th birthday

Mr. Seifert, you have been working at the University Language Centre since September 2017. What does a typical working day look like for you?

Over the semester, it's a typical teacher's day. Courses in Görlitz or Zittau in the mornings, usually in blocks of four lessons per week. In the afternoons, depending on the timetable, further courses, followed by a thorough follow-up. It's important for me to analyze what went well in class and what perhaps didn't work so well and which points I should repeat more thoroughly with the students next time. I then update the documents in OPAL to give students the opportunity to self-study and revise. Then I send an email to the students with the self-study tasks. On office-only days, I also deal with the long-term revision or reworking of courses and try to incorporate new teaching materials and current topics into my planning.

What distinguishes the Language Center at the HSZG and what is the current range of courses on offer?

Our Language Center is a service provider for the entire university, so to speak.  We potentially offer courses for all fields of study in English/German as a foreign language/Italian/Spanish/French as well as Polish, Czech and Russian. As far as possible, we make every effort to ensure that the content of the courses is geared towards the respective field of study. Our aim is to prepare our graduates for professional life in English and another foreign language.  In the positions of responsibility that our students all aspire to, the ability to communicate smoothly in foreign languages and in the respective subject area is an absolute must.  

What do you mean by "potentially"?

We are of course pleased that compulsory language training is firmly anchored in many degree courses. This is the only way to ensure international cooperation and interculturality. However, we would also like to see compulsory language courses become more widespread in those fields of study where this is not yet the case. After all, this is ultimately in the interests of our graduates, who might otherwise have to spend additional time and money on further training courses in their free time in order to fully meet the requirements of their respective employers.

Do you have a favorite subject that you teach?

Yes, I really enjoy teaching French. As it is the most widely taught language after English - at least in Germany - I would like to see a little more emphasis placed on French in order to achieve the communication skills in English and another language that I mentioned earlier. I am thinking here, for example, of students in tourism management or culture and management, but why not also future computer scientists?

Have you always worked as a language teacher and why are you so fascinated by this subject?

In my now 35-year career, I have worked both as a translator/interpreter, including many years at Bombardier in Görlitz, and as a teacher at various types of schools. Yes, languages have something attractive, fascinating, almost magical about them for me. We need language for everything we do: identifying, analyzing and solving problems, understanding our history and learning from it, understanding our place in this world and, of course, arguing, discussing and arguing.

My professional life began in 1988 with a job in the interpreting department of the GDR Foreign Ministry. It was here that I was inspired to write my book. Of course, I didn't know that at the time. But I always knew that I wanted to do something creative with language. And what could be more creative than a novel that you have written yourself and that tells a - hopefully exciting - story? When another idea came to me in 2016 during a city tour in Görlitz, the background of which is deeply rooted in the history of the city, it was clear to me that I would finally fulfill a lifelong dream and write a novel. It was published in October last year.

What is your novel about and how do you find the time to write alongside your work?

The plot of my book "The Secret of the French Ambassador" is a so-called crossover. It's a combination of GDR history, Görlitz history, scientific facts and ... a bit of mysticism. In my book, I deal with a mystery of human history that has still not been solved in every detail. I don't want to give any more away, because we want people to read the book ...

Yes, then there's the time factor. I mainly used the weekends and numerous vacation days, rather than the time after work. Of course, I benefited from the fact that the main phase of writing and revising coincided with the coronavirus years from 2020 to 2022. I always kept my teaching at the university and my work on this book strictly separate. However, this required a great deal of self-discipline.  

Were you also inspired by the HSZG, your colleagues or your students?

When I started working at the HSZG in the fall of 2017, the basic concept of the book was actually already in my head, so the inspiration was already there, so to speak. However, it took almost three years before I had developed the story arc far enough in my mind and started writing in April 2020. Nevertheless, my work here at the university certainly had an influence on my novel project. In conversations with students, for example, I learned time and again that many of them like to pick up a book and read in their free time and don't necessarily prefer a computer game. That encouraged me in my project. I also had a long conversation with students about the GDR past and could sense a clear interest in this time, which they no longer know from their own experience. We also talk about the pre-reunification period among colleagues from time to time.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Andreas Daniel Stock from the Culture and Management course and other students who held a creative writing workshop on the Görlitz campus in December last year. There I had the opportunity to present my book to an audience for the first time and explain my experiences of writing it.