Read more
Depicting the literary, erotic, political and clinical trajectory of the Swabian Frühromantiker Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843), Solomon's shapeshifting study presents an audacious English «remix» of Stephan Hermlin's 1970 radio drama Scardanelli, amplifying the complex contexts of Hölderlin's psychiatric committal and subsequent discharge into the home of a Tübingen carpenter in May 1807. Supplemented by a new translation of Hermlin's memoir essay «Hölderlin 1944» and the author's interdisciplinary texts and commentaries, this provocative volume furnishes a creative reinterpretation of a contribution to modern audio drama that will speak to playmakers and scholars engaged with German Romanticism, the poetics of translation and the cultural history of radio.
List of contents
CONTENTS: Hölderlin's Poltergeists - Hölderlin 1944 - «Spills of mire I swallowed inside the tower» (an audiopoetic symphony in five short movements).
About the author
Síomón Solomon is a poet, playwright, translator and editor. He holds a doctorate in German Studies from the University of London, for which he completed a thesis on the 'schizopoetics' of Friedrich Hölderlin. He lives in Dublin.
Report
«Hölderlin's Poltergeists offers a strikingly rich and multi-vocal celebration of Friedrich Hölderlin's 250th birthday. This unique homage to Hölderlin contains a highly original adaptation of Stephan Hermlin's much under-rated radio play Scardanelli (1970) as 'a drama for voices', supplemented by a learned but eminently accessible introduction, the first English translation of Hermlin's essay 'Hölderlin 1944', as well as an inspirational meditation on the poetics of the audio drama 'in five short movements'. In short, Solomon's work is a stunning testimony to the significance of the audiopoetic in our increasingly prosaic world.» (Rüdiger Görner, Professor of German at Queen Mary, University of London)
«This work is a beautiful, free and creative translation of a radio play by the East German author Stephan Hermlin about the major German poet Friedrich Hölderlin. It should be of interest to anyone teaching or studying German literature of the post-classical period. Solomon's book opens access to an extraordinarily creative poet who is superbly served by the playwright and his translator.» (Dan Farrelly, Senior Lecturer in German (retired), University College Dublin)
