DON’T FEAR THE WEIRD FESTIVAL AND NØRREBRO TEATER PRESENT Emma Holten and Morten Pape: The Vulnerable Human Being

We live in a society that celebrates the strong and successful individual, but what does that mean for our relationship with vulnerability, care, and community?

Authors Morten Pape and Emma Holten join moderator Iben Maria Zeuthen for a conversation about how we measure a person’s worth.

Drawing on experiences of growing up in a working-class family, living with mental illness, facing physical hardship and losing one’s footing, they will explore which lives are recognised and valued – and which risk being overlooked. Together, they will discuss why vulnerability is not an individual problem, but a shared concern that affects us all.

Emma Holten is a public commentator and author of Underskud, 2024. She has delivered numerous keynote lectures across Europe and the United States and regularly teaches and speaks at educational institutions, organisations, and businesses.

She has served as an expert in feminist economics on the expert forum of the European Institute for Gender Equality and is a member of the Women’s Rights Advisory Committee at Human Rights Watch. In 2023, she was appointed adviser to the Danish Government’s Power and Democracy Study.

Morten Pape is a novelist and screenwriter. He made his literary debut in 2015 with Planen, an autofictional novel about his upbringing in Urbanplanen, a social housing estate in Copenhagen’s Amager district.

Since then, he has published the award-winning novels Guds bedste børn, 2019 and I Ruiner, 2022. Together, these works form the acclaimed Amager Trilogy, in which Pape explores how environment, inheritance, and personal choices shape people’s life circumstances.

In his more recent family trilogy, he turns his attention to the stories of his parents and grandparents. Nøglebarn, 2024 and its sequel Månebarn, 2025 examine the generational scars left by love, neglect, and violence.

Iben Maria Zeuthen is a journalist and radio host best known for her in-depth portrait interviews. Her work frequently focuses on existential questions, faith, inequality, and climate issues, and has been featured on Danish broadcasters including DR P1, RADIO IIII, and the former Radio24syv.

Please note: the conversation is in Danish.

This conversation is presented in collaboration with Don’t Fear the Weird Festival 2026, organised by Psykinfo Region Hovedstaden.