The Suspended Landscape: Celan's Spatial Trauma and the Poetic Abyss

Lead Author Major

English

Lead Author Status

Senior

Format

Oral Presentation

Faculty Mentor Name

Jeffrey Hole

Faculty Mentor Department

English

Additional Faculty Mentor Name

Camille Norton

Additional Faculty Mentor Department

English

Abstract/Artist Statement

On what plane does the art of trauma reside? In what direction does it lie? Although photographs and film do well to capture the physical horrors and atrocities of the Holocaust, the visual domain is perhaps eclipsed by the sheer emotional charge of written testimony. In the case of Paul Celan, his shrouded accounts of concentration camps and post-war struggles are among the most vivid and moving writing to arise from that dark era. Celan's poems comprise many unique lyrical and literary elements, with special care consistently given to matters of nature, spatial geography, and the individuals the author associates with both. In his book Paul Celan: Poet, Survivor, Jew, John Felstiner tracks the development of Celan's distinct poetic setting in tandem with his biography, highlighting the various devastations that colored the young writer's work, and how key locations are built into his poems. Similarly, Antti Salminen investigates Celan's meditations on the liminal dimension of art, in "Falling Upwards: Paul Celan's Poetics of the Abyss", and how that space is reflected in his poetry. The task of this presentation is an attempt to bridge these two theories through the lenses of Celan's earlier work, drafted both during his internment and several years after his long-awaited release. I argue that, rather than establish a narrative of remembrance or a forum for discussion, Celan's poems strive to accomplish two things: a metaphysical collage of internalized suffering, and the extension of that pain through the artistic space of poetry.

Location

DeRosa University Center, Room 211

Start Date

28-4-2018 10:40 AM

End Date

28-4-2018 11:00 AM

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Apr 28th, 10:40 AM Apr 28th, 11:00 AM

The Suspended Landscape: Celan's Spatial Trauma and the Poetic Abyss

DeRosa University Center, Room 211

On what plane does the art of trauma reside? In what direction does it lie? Although photographs and film do well to capture the physical horrors and atrocities of the Holocaust, the visual domain is perhaps eclipsed by the sheer emotional charge of written testimony. In the case of Paul Celan, his shrouded accounts of concentration camps and post-war struggles are among the most vivid and moving writing to arise from that dark era. Celan's poems comprise many unique lyrical and literary elements, with special care consistently given to matters of nature, spatial geography, and the individuals the author associates with both. In his book Paul Celan: Poet, Survivor, Jew, John Felstiner tracks the development of Celan's distinct poetic setting in tandem with his biography, highlighting the various devastations that colored the young writer's work, and how key locations are built into his poems. Similarly, Antti Salminen investigates Celan's meditations on the liminal dimension of art, in "Falling Upwards: Paul Celan's Poetics of the Abyss", and how that space is reflected in his poetry. The task of this presentation is an attempt to bridge these two theories through the lenses of Celan's earlier work, drafted both during his internment and several years after his long-awaited release. I argue that, rather than establish a narrative of remembrance or a forum for discussion, Celan's poems strive to accomplish two things: a metaphysical collage of internalized suffering, and the extension of that pain through the artistic space of poetry.