Selected Poems [Paperback]

Hans Magnus Enzensberger (Author, Translator), Michael Hamburger (Translator), Fred Viebahn (Translator), Rita Dove (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 1999

Bilingual Edition

Hans Magnus Enzensberger is Germany's most important and influential living poet, a lightning rod in a stormy political and cultural landscape. The Sheep Meadow Press is proud to publish Enzensberger's Selected Poems, drawn from six volumes of his work. Sheep Meadow has also published his Kiosk (translated by the author and Michael Hamburger) and Lighter Than Air: Moral Poems, (translated by Reinhold Grimm).

Come of age after the Third Reich, Enzensberger builds his poetry upon titanic German wreckage and tradition. Always historical and provocative, his humanity dares to sport a sublime malice toward all and charity for few. His revelations have something in common with certain post-Renaissance painters, whose Madonnas are both spiritual and lascivious. Lawrence Joseph, in his introduction to Kiosk, writes, "Enzensberger, more than any poet of his generation anywhere in the world, comes before the public with his own precepts, codes and taboos . . . Whose work has delved into and captured the thought of our time to the extent that Enzensberger's has?"

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In over 40 years' work, German poet and cultural critic Enzenberger has captured the complex interlayerings of public and private realities, ultimately testifying to their difficult inseparability, their conflicts and contradictions. The product of the contrary forebears Bertolt Brecht and Gottfried Benn, among others, Enzenberger's poetry is a complex fusion of dramatic satire and meditative verse, quietly fixed on structures of oppression and coercion. Enzensbeger proceeds with intense, incisive portraits drawn as though by an inverse WhitmanAthe Pensioner, the Employee, the discreet Detective. This painterly method is often coupled with sometimes jarring transformations of figures and contexts, used not for the sake of aesthetics but for invoking moral consciousness, as in the early "Poem about the Future, November 1964": "Two men appear on a tractor/ (Chou En-Lai is in Moscow)/ Two men in stone-grey overalls/ (Nobel Prize-winners in evening dress)/ Two men with slender sticks/ (gold medals from Tokyo)/ at the wayside amid yellow leaves/ (the dead guerillas of Vietnam)..." The dangers of piety and self-righteousness are avoided by generous doses of self-indictment; Enzensbeger is a master of deflating senses of middle-class accomplishment, his own often foremost among them. The later work, particularly the new poems of Kiosk, gives way to a more philosophical, forgiving tone where observations and speculations on nature, evolution and mind are given freer reign: "the thought/ behind the other thought./ A pebble, ordinary,/ homogeneous, hard,/ not for sale." The translations by varying hands are consistently clear, capturing the sharp, spare style. (The Selected includes the German.) Though the forms and focus of this poetry change over time, its intent and integrity remain consistent, as do its richness and clarity. (Nov.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Born in Germany in 1929, Enzensberger grew up in Nazi Nuremberg and bloomed during the Cold War. His poetry is built upon titanic German wreckage and tradition: always historical, lyrical, and, in different ways, revolutionary. He dares to support a sublime malice towards all and charity for few. His revelations have something in common with the 16th century German painter Grunwald, whose Madonnas are both spiritual and lascivious. The result is poetry of terror and beauty few would attempt to write" -- Stanley Moss

Apocalypse. Umbrian Master, About 1490
Appearances
Asphodels
At Thirty-three
The Bell Jar
Bill Of Fare
The Blank Sheet
Camera Obscura
Clothes
Cold Comfort
The Comb
Concert Of Wishes
Consistency
Delete The Inapplicable
Dept. Of Philosophy
The Divorce
A Dream
The Employee
The End Of Owls
Fetish
For The Grave Of A Peace-loving Man
The Force Of Habit
The Frogs Of Bikini
Further Reasons Why Poets Do Not Tell The Truth
Gillis Van Conninxloo, Landscape: Panel, 65 X 119 Cm
A Hare In The Data Processing Centre
Historical Process
The Holiday
Homage To Godel
Identity Check
The Ironmonger's Shop
Joy
Karl Heinrich Marx
Keeping Cool
Lachesis Lapponica
Language Of The Country
Last Supper. Venetian, Sixteenth Century
Leeway
Limbic System
Middle Class Blues
The Midwives
Model Toward A Theory Of Cognition
Notice Of Loss
Old Couples
Old Revolution
The Other
Poem About The Future, November 1964
The Poison
Portrait Of A House Detective
Precursors
Purgatorio
Remote House
The Reprieve
Research Council
Residual Light
The Rest On The Flight, Flemish, 1521
Rondeau
Security Considerations
Shadow Realm
Shore
Short History Of The Bourgeoisie
Sightseeing Tour
Sleeping Pill
Song For Those Who Know
A Staircase
Strange Attractor
Summer Poem
Thoughts On The Run: 1
Thoughts On The Run: 2
Thoughts On The Run: 3
Thoughts On The Run: 4
Towards Eternal Peace
Valse Triste Et Sentimentale
The Vanished
Vanished Work
Vending Machine
Visiting Ingres
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

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Product Details

• Paperback: 281 pages
• Publisher: Sheep Meadow; Bilingual German-English ed. edition (August 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1878818732
• ISBN-13: 978-1878818737
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,043,184 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Some of the most powerful poems of the 20th century, August 27, 2009

By 

JOHN A. STOVALL "bibliophile and technogeek" (Dublin, TX United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Selected Poems (Paperback)

I you like poems of the world from the transhuman perspective you must read this. We have here a german Robinson Jeffers. The End of Owls and Strange Attractor are poems worth committing to memory.