Briefwechsel: Paul Celan und Ilana Shmueli

by Peter Szondi, Christoph König, Peter Szondi

Rare Book

Genres: Poetry

242 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Peter Szondi was Professor of Comparative Literature at the Free University in Berlin. He is the author of groundbreaking works on the theory of drama, on literary hermeneutics, on Hölderlin, and on Celan.

Reviews

[Tatyana · Rating 5 out of 5]

"You should know that I talk to you almost all the time, I hope it is not a burden to you"
- Ilana Shmueli to Paul Celan (October 19, 1969)

"I ask myself again and again whether you want and need me and to what extent you really want and need me, whether what I bring is not too little, for you. On the other hand, again, I have the great and absolute wish to give you everything that I hold ready for you inside me, & that cannot remain one-sided after all. You see, I am trying to be simple, and you know it is anything but simple."
- Ilana Shmueli to Paul Celan (October 19, 1969)

"I see you, as you are departing in the night, see you passing over into this night, and wish I were there, at the other end, to take you up into the unsayable.
With my arms around you, at the gates of everything that is in vain, in spite of it all."
- Paul Celan, in a letter to Ilana Shmueli (October 21, 1969)