Die Reihe P bietet eine Sammlung zeitgenössischer Lyrik, die bedeutende internationale Stimmen der modernen Poesie umfasst. Durch sorgfältige Nachdichtungen wird den deutschen Lesern ein Zugang zu diesen wichtigen lyrischen Werken ermöglicht, wodurch die Vielfalt und Tiefe der aktuellen Poesieszene erlebbar wird.
Christopher Middleton Book order (chronological)
Christopher Middleton is a poet and translator whose work explores the intricacies of human experience through carefully crafted language. His poetry often engages in a dialogue with the European literary tradition while maintaining a distinctive, introspective tone. Middleton's mastery lies in weaving philosophical considerations with evocative imagery, offering readers a profound and stimulating encounter. His extensive translation work has also enriched the literary landscape, making key works from German-language literature accessible to an English-speaking audience.
Published in 1908, the novel is a notebook, a boy?s impressions of life at the school for servants run by the brother and sister Benjamenta. The lesson of the school is humility and the rejection of power and ambition. It is a lesson that the narrator, Jakob von Gunten, learns well. From his vantage point, he is able to see through the absurd posturings of his fellow students. Like his creation Jakob von Gunten, Robert Walser understood of the attractions of infinitesimal smallness and kept well away from the corruptions and temptations of literary life. An outsider who spent his last twenty-seven years in an asylum, Walser was a writer?s writer whose work was much admired by Kafka, Hesse and Mann. His voice appeals to all those who savour silence in an epoch of deafening noise. Now a major feature film directed by the Quay Brothers, Institute Benjamenta is Walser?s masterpiece. Ninety years after its first publication, this edition offers the chance to read a truly extraordinary classic.
The Quest for Christa T.
- 185 pages
- 7 hours of reading
When The Quest for Christa T. was first published in East Germany in 1968, there was an immediate storm: bookshops in East Berlin were given instructions to sell it only to well-known customers professionally involved in literary matters; at the annual meeting of East German Writers Conference, Mrs Wolf's new book was condemmed. Yet the novel has nothing explicitly to do with politics.Praise for The Quest for Christa T.On the surface we merely have the story of a sensitive woman as recalled by her friend. On this level Christa T. was a good citizen who did as she was told and lived a seemingly unexceptional life. But between the lines lies the real story of Christa T. -- the story of an individual crushed by the pressures of uniformity. If you bear in mind it is the first novel of any consequence to emerge from Ulbricht's East Germany, then it becomes something of a literary landmark. - John Barkman, New York PostThe contours of silence and the outline of things articulately left unsaid loom large in the muted brilliance of this novel. - Ernst Pawek, The New York Review of BooksIt is a courageous book that breaks taboos and, as we have come to expect from Christa Wolf, it is infused with an integrity and a deep moral concern. . . - The (London) Times Literary Supplement