For the Dying Calves

In his four Lord Weidenfeld Lectures held in Oxford in 2019, poet Durs Grünbein deals with a topic that has occupied his mind ever since the moment he started to perceive his own position within the history of his nation, his language community and his family as historic: How is it possible that HISTORY, the fetish of the humanities since Hegel and Marx, determines the individual imagination into the private niches, into the ludic drive of poetry? Shouldn’t its poetry look at the world with its own, sovereign eyes instead?

In the form of a collage or »photosynthesis«, in image and text, Grünbein lets the fundamental opposition between poetic licence and almost overwhelming bondage to history appear in an exemplary way: From the seeming trifle of a stamp with the portrait of Adolf Hitler he moves through the phenomenon of the »Führer’s streets«, the autobahn that is, and into the inferno of aerial warfare. In the end, however, we are faced with an initial experience of powerlessness in writing and the realisation, valid to this day, that come from it: »There is something beyond literature that questions all writing. And there is literature, that intersects history in fictions.«

The renowned Lord Weidenfeld Lectures have been one of the highlights of the academic year at Oxford University since 1993. Invited are distinguished scholars in the humanities, writers and poets. Previous Weidenfeld Visiting Professors of European Comparative Literature include George Steiner, Umberto Eco, Amos Oz and Mario Vargas Llosa.

»[S]ardonic humor, the savagery, the violent candor – all expressed in lines of cool formal elegance.« Helen Vendler, New Republic

»For a rather long time now – approximately, since the Berlin Wall came down – the name Durs Grünbein has been the answer to the question: Who’s the leading young poet in Germany?« James Fenton, Guardian

»Grünbein loves to jump from one register to another – one moment he is the street poet of Berlin, the next ... all marble and ancient philosophy.« Philip Ottermann, Independent

»Durs Grünbein‘s fascinating attempt at an alternative history of the Nazi era.« Manfred Osten, DIE WELT 

»With his – in the best sense – politically engaged lectures Durs Grünbein makes his contribution against the disastrous longing for a closed-off society.« Kai Sina, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

»Durs Grünbein‘s brilliant stream of thought should be discussed and read by many.« Peter Helling, NDR

»Grünbein’s inspired reseach is as convincing as the different perspective with which he makes the familiar unfamiliar once more.« Hermann Wallmann, WDR

»Based on historic detail and equipped with enormous knowledge, [Durs Grünbein] traces historic coordinates and searches for the connections between technology, ideology and language.« Jörg Schieke, MDR KULTUR