Over a period of five years, the funding will be used to build an international team of young and advanced researchers to study, under the guidance of Professor Küpper, European drama and theater of the early modern period as the first mass medium in history. In addition, the interaction with other cultures, such as with Japan and with India, will be investigated. During this period Küpper will write a book dealing with the issue of how cultural exchange processes differ from economic and political processes. The hypothesis here is the idea that art and culture are open networks.

Joachim Küpper, born in 1952, has been teaching at the Institute of Romance Languages and Literature and the Peter Szondi Institute of Comparative Literature, both at Freie Universität Berlin, since 2000. In 1987 he received the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize for his research and in 2001 the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize. His research interests include European literature from the Middle Ages to the 19th century, the theory of literature, and the comparison of the arts.

The Advanced Investigator Grants of the European Research Council (ERC) are intended to support established researchers to achieve outstanding and innovative basic research. In this round of calls the ERC supports researchers working at European institutions with about 490 million euros.