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"Poems "is translation of Georg Trakl s first book of verse published by Kurt Wolff in 1913, which"quickly established Trakl as one of the leading exemplars of Austrian German Expressionism. Rivalling and receiving the praise of Rainer Maria Rilke, Else Lasker-Schuler, and other contemporaries, Trakl attracted patronage of Ludwig Wittgenstein, who famously wrote of Trakl s poems that I do not understand them, but their "tone" pleases me. It is the tone of a truly ingenious person. This pleasure/problem comes with reading Trakl to this day given the interest in and influence of his work, especially evinced in translation. Here has been no end to how Trakl "should "be interpreted such that each attempt to translate him, which is like scaling a blue glass mountain within which is the "corrected "way to understand his poems. Such attempts have given him a place, too, in the world s canon of literature. In this fresh attempt, "Poems "marks the first volume in James Reidel s "Our Trakl," a cycle that marks the hundredth anniversary of Trakl s death in 1914 during the first months of World War I. Unlike previous selected and collected poems, Reidel is mindful of how Trakl wanted to be read experienced, for he carefully prepared the order and content to achieve a certain effect and musicality in keeping with the art of his pianist sister and putative lover. Reidel, too, is mindful that Trakl belonged to two centuries, and thus these translations have a historicity of language that other renderings lack. The second volume in the cycle is Trakl s second book, "Sebastian Dreaming," and a third, consisting of published and unpublished poetry and prose, are forthcoming."
About the author
Georg Trakl (1887-1914) wird von klein auf durch den heraufdämmernden Untergang der K. und K.-Monarchie geprägt. 1905 beginnt er ein Praktikum in einer Salzburger Apotheke. 1906 werden zwei Einakter, die er später vernichtet, im Salzburger Stadttheater aufgeführt. Er bewegt sich zunehmend in Bohème-Kreisen; sein lebenslanger Alkohol- und Drogenkonsum und das leidvolle inzestuöse Verhältnis zu seiner Schwester Margarethe gehen auf diese Zeit zurück. 1908 siedelt er zum Studium der Pharmazie nach Wien über. Bis zum Ausbruch des 1. Weltkrieges 1914 pendelt Trakl in Probediensten und auf der Suche nach Anstellungen, die er meist schnell wieder aufgibt, zwischen Salzburg, Wien und Innsbruck. Ab 1912 werden seine Gedichte im Brenner erstveröffentlicht; außerdem publiziert er in der Fackel von Karl Kraus. 1914 zieht Trakl als Medikamentenakzessist mit einer Sanitätskolonne nach Galizien in den Krieg, von wo er im Anschluss an die Schlacht bei Grodek zur Beobachtung seines Geisteszustandes nach Krakau überwiesen wird. Dort stirbt er am 3. November an einer Überdosis Kokain.
Summary
Georg Trakl is an Austrian-German expressionist. This translation marks the hundredth anniversary of Trakl's death during the first months of World War I. It introduces readers to the powerful verses of this wartime poet.
