Description
Coloured Handprints introduces the work of 20 contemporary German-speaking poets, from Germany, Austria and Switzerland, to an English-language readership. Edited by Anatoly Kudryavitsky, and translated from the German by Kudryavitsky and Yulia Kudryavitskaya the volume explores the reunified Germany, sometimes from the vantage point of “the train halted in the middle of the track” (‘hamburg – berlin’, by Jan Wagner), as it also reveals a modern Europe of “administrative chaos draped in / Brussels lace” (‘Ach, Europa’, by Nora Bossong). More than anything, however, it asserts the power of poetry to balance dissent, fierce emotion and calm observation in forms that draw on the past but speak to the present and the future.
FEATURED POETS:
Michael AUGUSTIN (G.), Nora BOSSONG (G), Manfred CHOBOT (A.), Daniela DANZ (G.), Ludwig FELS (G./A.), Brigitte FUCHS (S.), Durs GRÜNBEIN (G.), Annette HAGEMANN (G.), Ulla HAHN (G.), Felix Philipp INGOLD (S.), Mathias JESCHKE (G.), Uwe KOLBE (G.), Anton G. LEITNER (G.), Sabina NAEF (S.), Anne RABE (G.), Ilma RAKUSA (S.), Robert SCHINDEL (A.), Peter TURRINI (A.), Jan WAGNER (G.) and Eva Christina ZELLER (G.).
(G=GERMANY; A=AUSTRIA; S=SWITZERLAND)
Ah, Europa
Nora Bossong
She belongs in these narrow, unquiet meadows, a king’s daughter
with an irrational fear of bulls. Who can blame her
after all that has happened? She suffered from wars as people
suffer from colds. Her apron is full of windfall countries from the plain;
Babel built upon every blade of grass, administrative chaos draped in
Brussels lace. Lunatics and dignitaries she puts on display,
gabbers and evil minds. The marsh marigold would be
the safe choice, but we like something about her,
Europa, a frightened dwarf at the end of the world. We encourage her
and assume that one day she’ll come good.
The Camera in the Service of Ethnology
Daniela Danz
I saw a photo of a man from
the tribe of Shubi showing off his body
and laughing his arms squeezed by
massive bracelets
were thin below the shoulders like those
of the boy he once was under the shiny
well-rounded muscles of the man he’s become
I saw man as a tree
that keeps growing over its wounds
the flesh the bark our
shape all our useless pride
ISBN 9781910251119 Paperback
140 x 216 mm, 174 pp
October 2015
