 He was much more open in his criticism of the East German government's 1976 expulsion of a contemporary poet, Wolf Biermann, whose poetry Hermlin exhibited some years previously.Going against the official politics of the day, he, in conjunction with Erich Honecker, organized a conference of writers dedicated to the furthering of peace and reconciliation, the Berliner Begegnung.He was also a member of the Schriftstellerverband der DDR and the Akademie der Künste West Berlin (English