20 years of word sailing: Tholey celebrates creative writing competition!

20 years of word sailing: Tholey celebrates creative writing competition!

The Tholey community’s “Wortsegel” writing competition celebrated its 20th birthday on Thursday, June 13, 2025 in the Sotzweiler Heldenrechhalle. The event, which marks a significant anniversary, looks back on two decades of motivating young talent to develop their creative writing experiences. In his speech, Mayor Andreas Maldener (CDU) reviewed the development of the competition and emphasized how important it is to familiarize young people with the world of language at an early stage and to give them a voice.

The competition was launched in 2005 and aims to promote literary ventures, diversity of thought and creative freedom. Over the past 20 years, “Wortsegel” has provided a platform on which hundreds of award winners from various types of schools and thousands of submissions from young people between the ages of 8 and 19 could be celebrated.

Motto and objectives of the competition

For the anniversary year, the competition has chosen the motto “Future – if words remain”. This motto aims to encourage participants to think about the past, present and future. Not only are texts created, but insights are also given into the hopes and life plans of the young generation. In addition, an archive is created that records the impressions and thoughts of the participants.

In order to deepen the content of the submitted texts, discussions are held in classes or courses about the development of assessment criteria and the selection of the texts to be submitted. The result of this creative discussion are 20 brochures full of poetry that document the diversity of the submissions.

Writing impulses from the past

As additional inspiration for the young people, ten quotes from previous rounds of the competition were provided as writing impulses. These quotes come from well-known authors and are intended to encourage participants to formulate creative thoughts. The writers whose words serve as inspiration include J. W. von Goethe, Wolf Biermann and Bertolt Brecht.

• „Zur rechten Zeit fällt einem nie was ein…“ (J. W. von Goethe)
• „Du, lass dich nicht verhärten in dieser harten Zeit …“ (Wolf Biermann)
• „Wenn man sich umwendet, sieht man Fußspuren …“ (Rose Ausländer)
• „Und zur Fremde wird die Heimat, Und zur Nähe wird die Ferne.“ (Theodor Fontane)
• „Lad sie ein, freundlich, wenn Du weißt, wo sie ist …“ (Johannes Kühn)
• „Das Perfekt und das Imperfekt tranken Sekt. Sie stießen aufs Futurum an.“ (Christian Morgenstern)
• „Von einer Katze lernen, heißt siegen lernen …“ (Robert Gernhardt)
• „Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich herkomme. Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich hinfahre.“ (Bertolt Brecht)
• „Ihm ist, als ob es tausend Stäbe gäbe und hinter tausend Stäben keine Welt.“ (Rainer Maria Rilke)
• „Längst Gesagtes wieder sagen, hab` ich endlich gründlich satt.“ (Christian Morgenstern)

The word sailing competition is therefore not only a place for creative exchange, but also an important element in Tholey's educational landscape. The mayor emphasized the role of the pioneers who laid the foundation for this successful competition 20 years ago. The commitment to literary education and expression will continue in the coming years to encourage the creativity of our youth.

For further information, please visit the Saarbrücker Zeitung and the official website of Tholey.