Yesterday in the mail I received a copy of a beautiful book, “Last Living Words: The Ingeborg Bachmann Reader.” The book is from one of our internet/blogger family members with whom I’ve had the great pleasure of sharing a few emails and some phone conversations.
We know her in the blog world as starkravinglunaticradical, many of us call her “stark”. In the real world she is Dr. Lilian M Friedberg, or Lil. I’ve not ever heard her refer to herself as “Dr”, but it is a title she has earned and is worthy of. I hope she won’t mind me using it here.
Now, I will admit to my total unfamiliarity with Ingeborg Bachmann’s work, and from what little I have already read of some of the poetry in the book, my education, indeed my life has been quite incomplete by having missed out on it to this point.
From the book cover I will share with you the barest of sketches of Bachmann’s life:
“Born in Klagenfurt, Austria on June 25, 1926, Ingeborg Bachmann studied law and philosophy at the universities of Insbruck, Graz and Vienna. She received her degree, writing a disertation on Heideger, from the University of Vienna in 1950. After graduating she became a scriptwriter at Radio Rot-WeiB-Rot in Vienna, and in 1953 won the Gruppe 47 Prize for her first collection of poems, “The Mortgage on Borrowed Time.” Over the next many years, she produced numerous collections of poetry, fiction and radio plays and the novel ‘Malina’.”
This book, “Last Living Words,” contains many selections of her work. I have begun at the ending. . .as my intuition suggested, and have loved her from the first words of her poems.
The work that our “stark” or Dr Lil has done is mind boggling. She has translated these works from German into English so that those of us less linguistically inclined might enjoy the scope and beauty of it. Anyone that speaks or is familiar with another language will probably be as impressed by her translation work as I am. Translating anything into English is a very daunting task and to accomplish it in a way that keeps the integrity and meaning of an authors words is really quite stunning.
From the book cover:
“This Ingeborg Bachmann Reader consists of works of poetry and fiction published during the life of the great Austrian writer. Brilliantly tanslated by Lilian M. Friedberg. Friedberg’s Bachmann is no longer the frail and tortured writer presented in so many previous translations, but is a writer who stands as a strong woman and major literary figure.”
Those of you who know me a little, and those who are equally as owned by the words we write, will understand why this poem struck me from the first moment:
YOU WORDS
You words, march, follow me!
and even if we’ve gone further,
gone too far, there’s still a long way to go,
even further, there is no end to it.It’s not getting any lighter.
This word
will only
bring other words in its wake,
sentence for sentence.
That’s how the world
would have its way,
be said and done,
once and for all.
She won’t say.Words, follow me,
that once and for all never comes
-not to this lust for words
and diction to contradiction!For a while now
put emotion to rest, let
the heart muscle
move on.Let it go, I say, let it go.
Not a word in the supreme ear,
nothing, I say, whispered,
let not one word of death in,
let go, and follow me, not gently
nor embittered,
not bursting with consolation,
without consolation,
signifying nothing,
thus not without sign-Just spare me this: the image
spun from the fabric of dust, the empty garble
of syllables, last dying words.Not another word,
you words!
Thank you for this beautiful work, Lil/Stark. I am feeling very blessed today. I think many of you will enjoy the words of Bachmann.
Any of you who might wish to read this work or have this book in your collection, you may order it at: Green Integer, the Publisher’s web site. It is also available at the usual book outlets, but the compensation advantage for Lil is best if ordered from the publisher.
You can visit Lil’s Blog at Historical Footnotes
