Poet Clara Lösel: From social media phenomenon to bestselling author

Clara Lösel is happy about every minute of waiting these weeks. The young poet from Gießen has hardly found time for a break since her first volume of poetry was published in April last year. Fueled by her videos, which are regularly published on Instagram and Tiktok and viewed millions of times, the band “woe you give up” shot to the top of several bestseller lists. Lösel presented excerpts from the 101 poems at readings, and thousands of fans listened to her.

Shortly after the turn of the year, it graced the cover of the drugstore chain dm's customer magazine - not the usual forum for authors, but a magazine with an enormous reach. Another tour followed and a single sung together with Bosse; the musician and his bandmates also brought the woman in her mid-twenties onto the concert stage. Don't forget a series of PR appointments with television stations and other media. And in between, the poet artist, daughter of a teacher couple, wrote numerous new texts. Because after the first book is before the second book. Especially since the first volume is selling phenomenally.

While “woe bet thou give up” had been sold a good 50,000 times by late last autumn, the publisher has now sold around 200,000 copies, according to the author's management. In any case, it feels surreal, says Lösel. The same applies to the 3.6 million views of one of her latest videos. To grasp such numbers, she always imagines people with books or smartphones in their hands. Her father, who earns his living as a state secretary in Hesse, initially wondered whether the initially planned print run of 1,000 was too high, as Clara Lösel says with a smile. The concerns were no coincidence: some poets report being happy with 500 volumes sold. However, the father did the math without social media and his daughter's hundreds of thousands of followers.

Lösel changed publishers for the follow-up volume. She now publishes with Rowohlt. Her second volume will be published in time for the Frankfurt Book Fair on October 6th. “I thought only I felt things like that” is the title. Given the success of “woe you give up,” Rowohlt is reaching high on the shelf: the publisher is releasing the follow-up volume with an initial print run of 100,000. Like the first novel, it contains 101 texts and once again promises “clear text”, as the author puts it with a wink, and contributions “that will change your life”. Anyone who doesn't know the first book may find it to be a bit full-bodied or even megalomaniacal. But anyone who knows about readers' reactions to Lösel's texts is not bothered by this at all.

Before the market launch, the author rushes from one appointment to the next. How does she feel? “Between pressure on the one hand and anticipation on the other,” she says during a walk on Schiffenberg above Gießen, for which she is wearing a light gray shirt and a bulky brown leather jacket in addition to wide light blue jeans. The pressure comes from her head. "It's always been like that. At school, I cried a lot during every exam period, but I got good grades," she reports. At the university it was the same when studying to become a teacher. A good omen for the new release? Yes, says Clara Lösel, drawing out the word. However, there is a difference.

Before her first novel was published, she had no expectations - “really none at all,” she assures. But now “woe bet thou give up” is still at the top of the “Spiegel” bestseller list. “And I don’t understand it,” says the young woman with her curly blonde hair tied in a braid like in her videos. Especially since Amazon and Thalia no longer listed the book at the top of their racing lists. And the volume no longer immediately catches the eye in bookstores. Basically, all that remains is for readers to recommend the volume or give it as a gift, as she thinks. But she can live with that thought. Because: “The bookstore put it up there because people wanted it.”

The sales success, the fully booked shows, all the appointments, here today, there tomorrow – all of this has its price. The young author says she sometimes wakes up in a hotel and doesn't know where she is at first. That sounds like the touring phenomenon sung about by Jackson Browne in “The load-out”. Clara Lösel also posted photos of herself on a drip and receiving an infusion. “It all happened so quickly that sometimes I feel like I can’t quite keep up,” she admits frankly.

Sometimes her body sends her signals. She believes in an interaction between body and mind and knows about the risk of burnout. “And that’s why I’m now more conscious of maintaining a good balance between my private life and work.” However, a tour gives her a lot of strength: “I would miss it so much.” She always wrote for herself first, when no one was listening to her. But now she writes largely for people. It is important to be able to see the audience and build a connection with them.

Despite all the stress, she still has to find creative moments. Because her fans, from female teenagers to pensioners, are looking forward to new texts. And Clara Lösel finds these moments regularly. To this end, she doesn't slavishly sit down at her desk at the same times. Ideas for lines jump out at them. “Sometimes I run out of the shower and write something down,” she once said. Or spontaneously on the S-Bahn in Berlin, where she now lives most of the year, often staying in her old homeland. And what she writes must first please her. But she knows about the expectations placed on her. So she gave her new texts to a small group of people to read - her family and friends. People who honestly told her their opinion. They were pleased with the feedback. “That helps me.”

She even found some distance from her book during a two-week vacation. Looking at the texts with a “fresh eye” afterwards also benefited her. “When I read it, I thought: it’s not so bad,” she says with a laugh. She feels comfortable posting these posts and going on stage with them. It will happen again in the second half of October. Clara Lösel appears in Berlin, Hamburg and Cologne. She won't be back in Hesse until next year. A performance at Frankfurt's Jahrhunderthalle is scheduled for May 30th.

Before that, however, she will present “I thought only I felt something like that” during the Frankfurt Book Fair. But she already has more in mind: During a recent train journey, she noticed that she already had a well-filled document. Intended working title: Book three.