Karl Schlögel, a German historian and essayist who has specialized in Eastern Europe, has won the 2025 Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. He will speak and be presented with the €25,000 (about $28,800) prize on October 19 in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt during the Frankfurt Book Fair.
Karin Schmidt-Friderichs, president of the Börsenverein and chairwoman of the board of trustees of the Peace Prize, said, "In his distinguished body of work, German historian and essayist Karl Schlögel combines empirical historiography with personal experience. As a scholar and flâneur, an archaeologist of modernity and a seismograph of social change, he explored the cities and landscapes of Central and Eastern Europe long before the fall of the Iron Curtain. Through his writing, Schlögel placed the cities of Kyiv, Odesa, Lviv and Kharkiv on the mental map of his readers. He also repeatedly characterised Saint Petersburg and Moscow as European cities. His unique narrative style combines observation, insight and feeling, a blend that allows him to effectively challenge existing prejudices while also awakening our curiosity. After Russia's annexation of Crimea, Schlögel sharpened his focus on Ukraine, inviting us to join him in reflecting on Germany's own blind spots regarding the region. His was one of the first voices to warn of Vladimir Putin's aggressive expansionist policies and authoritarian-nationalist claims to power. Today, Schlögel continues to affirm Ukraine's place in Europe, calling for its defence as essential to our shared future. His enduring message is both clear and urgent: Without a free Ukraine, there can be no peace in Europe."
Schlögel's works include Terror und Traum: Moskau 1937 (Terror and Dream: Moscow 1937), Das Sowjetische Jahrhundert: Archäologie einer Untergegangenen Welt (The Soviet Century: Archaeology of a Vanished World), Der Duft der Imperien: Chanel No 5 und Rotes Moskau (The Scent of Empires: Chanel No. 5 and Red Moscow), and Moskau Lesen (Reading Moscow). His most recent book, American Matrix, published in 2023, is an examination of the affinities and differences between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.