Inquiries to fellow snobs

A thread devoted to asking questions and seeking input from our colleagues in this group--we have a diversity of smart readers here and if you're looking for thoughts on a certain writer, an opinion regarding an obscure literary offering, this is the place for you.

My question is directed toward any aficionados of German literature and poetry:

I recently picked up Michael Hamburger's anthology of modern German poetry, which covers the 20th century to around 1975. But I would also like to pick up a volume that encompasses much of the subsequent years. Obviously, as a non-German, I'm looking for a bilingual edition so if anyone can think of a title meeting that criteria, let me know.

No German poetry fans in this group? Sheesh...

Ah, well, I dug up this one and it might do the job:

http://www.amazon.ca/Twentieth-Century-German-Poetry-Michael-Hofmann/dp/03745309...

(P.S. No, I didn't buy it through Amazon.)

How did you like the Hamburger anthology? I bought it eons ago and have never read it. Your post reminded me that I have it.

That anthology, as they say, is in the mail. En Route. Bought through eBay for a very reasonable price. Looking forward to it. Hamburger's translations of Celan are still the best. The man had an ear...

When I search "German poetry" in my brain, my brain returns grayness and silence. Which sounds like the title of an anthology of German poetry. . . .

RETURNING TO GRAYNESS & SILENCE: BEST GERMAN WAR POEMS.

I like it, Geoff.

Returning to Field Grey and Silence: Best German War Poetry - surely? :-)

Greyness and Silence: An Introduction to German Cuisine.

>8 mejix: Is that the wurst you can do?

Please, stop...

Reminds me of a cookbook I was planning writing: "The Afterbirth of Hannah Arendt: An Introduction to German Nouvelle Cuisine".

I once commented to an Austrian friend of mine that Austrian cooking (which is fairly similar to German) could best be described as "stick-to-yer-ribs". He paused for a moment whilst parsing the sentence into German, and then said "That's probably very true."

The first person to pun on "sour Kraut"...

Jesus, I just did.

They do dead pig very well, though.

"Die Stille und die Graue" - a great collection. Actually Goethe's lyric poetry is sometimes brilliant. He was a much better poet than playwright, novelist or scientist.
Of course, these are real poems with rhythm and rhyme and beauty, not just collections of short lines, so you really have to know German pretty well to enjoy them.

Anyone here read Jonathan Franzen's THE KRAUS PROJECT? I've been waiting for it via inter-library loan for weeks...

Anyone know of a good, authoritative account of the civil war in Germany, post World War I? Communists versus the fascists and freikorps (demobilized soldiers)--and we all know who won...but it could have gone the other way and I'd like to know why it didn't.

Suggestions for reading?

My library suggests:

Richard Bessel, Germany after the First World War (fairly academic, concentrates closely on the formal politics of the time)
Richard J. Evans, The coming of the Third Reich
Mary Fulbrook, The Fontana history of Germany, 1918-1990: the divided nation (considers the divisions in Germany from 1918 onwards)
Chris Harman, The lost revolution: Germany 1918-23 (a hard Leftist perspective)
Nigel Jones, A brief history of the birth of the Nazis (cover subtitle: How the Freikorps blazed a trail for Hitler) (cover presentation looks like a fairly standard Hitlerfest, but don't be misled)
Victor Serge, Witness to the German revolution (of course)
Eric D. Weitz, Weimar Germany; promise and tragedy (a fairly good examination of the Weimar Republic with quite a big section on the transition from Reich to republic in the early years)

One of the key figures:

Paul Frölich, Rosa Luxemburg; ideas in action (the Left's standard biog of Luxembourg, which has quite a bit of analysis of her ideology)

Of these, I'd suggest the Harman will perhaps have the deepest examination of the politics, albeit viewed from the Left; the Jones tends to concentrate on the Freikorps and street actions; and the Weitz looks at the events in overview in preparation for a wider look at Weimar Germany (it's a fairly good perspective on Weimar Germany as a whole, both politically and culturally, though not without quirks - see reviews, including mine, here: http://www.librarything.com/work/3882346/reviews/75967909)

Thank you, Robert, that was exactly what I was looking for.

To me, the defeat of the Communists in Germany and the rise of the fascists is one of those "hinges of history" they talk about. A great big "What if..." that, of course, can never be answered.

Another book that has been suggested to me is Pierre Broue's THE GERMAN REVOLUTION, published by Haymarket press.

Thanks, again.

Anyone here read My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgard? Is it any good or all hype?

#20 I've been curious about that myself.

I have it on the TBR.

20: I read only (most of) the piece that appeared in the New Yorker. That was enough for me.

What turned you off, Geoff? Just not a memoir of interest...or (like me) do you usually give such things a wide berth?

Love, love, LOVE it; I'm on volume 2 now. There's no reason I should be addicted to the detailed account of the everyday-- but I've stopped questioning it.