Description
Book SynopsisPoetic Affairs deals with the complex and fascinating interface between literature and life through the prism of the lives and works of the German-Jewish poet and Holocaust survivor, Paul Celan (1920-70), the Leningrad native, US poet laureate, and Nobel Prize winner, Joseph Brodsky (1940-96), and the most significant contemporary German poet, Durs Grünbein (born 1962).
Trade Review"At the present juncture of new possibilities for critical strategies,
Poetic Affairs: Celan, Grnbein, Brodsky sheds, at times, its paradigmatic weight and achieves, beyond boundaries set by codified procedures of discourse, a fidelity to its exploration borne by succinctness of style and the confident subjectivity of informed insight . . . Eskin's book is a valuable illumination of Celan, Grnbein, and Brodsky." -- James Brasfield *
Comparative Literature Studies *
"Michael Eskin's study of Paul Celan, Dors Grünbein, and Joseph Brodsky is a bold experiment in biographical criticism. . . . Eskin brings new questions to translation study and persona theory by framing them as ethical practices, and any reader of Celan, Grünbein, or Brodsky will nd much to ponder and appreciate in his meticulously detailed readings of their work." -- Mark Payne *
Modern Philology *
"In his extraordinarily entertaining and original study
Poetic Affairs, Michael Eskin strategically uses the Goll affair, the Livilla affair and the Brodsky affair as the concrete basis for a well-grounded analysis of the poetics of three outstanding voices of modern poetry: Paul Celan, Durs Grubein, and Joseph Brodsky . . . With
Poetic Affairs Michael Eskin proves to be—once again—an astonishing researcher in matters of poetic dialogues, a genuine expert of literary interlocutions." --
Focus on German Studies"This strikingly original study scrutinizes works by three modern poets responding to earlier poets in order to advance a compelling argument about the relation between the personal and public in the realm of literature. Eskin's three 'affairs' show that writing poetry is a messy business and that the richest readings take account of its constant transgression of comfortable boundaries." -- Derek Attridge * University of York *
Table of Contents@fmct:Contents @toc4:Acknowledgments iii Prefatory Note iii Abbreviations iii @toc2:Introduction: On Poetry, Life, Method, and Sundry Affairs 1 Chapter 1 Creative Fidelities 00 Chapter 2 From Encounter to Tryst: Celan and Shakespeare 00 Chapter 3 Metaphors of Subjectivity: Gr'nbein and the philosophers 000 Chapter 4 What's in a Name?: Brodsky and the English Muse 000 Closing Remarks 000 @toc4:Appendix: Constellations 000 Notes 000 Bibliography 000 Index 000
