dublinka

Ingeborg Bachmann's star is still on the up. There was a reading in Venice recently to discuss her work. Unfortunately I had just arrived and missed it. A pity. As a leading voice in post-war German literature, her poetry is often dark cold and serious, but frosted with beauty:

Great Bear, come down, shaggy night,
cloud-coated beast with the old eyes, star eyes.
Through the thickets your paws break
shimmering with their claws,
star claws.

(from Anrufung des Großen Bären, 1956)