I still haven't been to the Buchmesse, but I might go to the London Book Fair.

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Looking back, pt. 2

  "Die 'Universitaeten' als 'Staetten der wissenschaftlichen Forschung und Lehre' (solcher Art sind sie Gebilde des 19. Jahrhunderts) werden zu reinen und immer 'wirklichkeitsnaeheren' Betriebsanstalten, in denen nichts zur Entscheidung kommt. Den letzten Rest einer Kulturdekoration werden sie nur so lange behalten, als sie vorerst noch zugleich Mittel zur 'kulturpolitischen' Propaganda bleiben muessen." (Martin Heidegger, Beitraege zur Philosophie, c. 1937) It's already November and I haven't posted anything here since June. There was no interesting event I've been to and of which I could have given an account. After last year's disappointment (see April post) I didn't feel like attending Translation Day, all the more, since there hasn't been any notable sign of interest in my work as a translator into English for the last two years, i.e. since I arrived in the UK. This concerns mainly my translation of Yiannis Ritsos, ...
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Looking back on my first year as an author/translator in Britain

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Goetz, Meyer, Schroeder: A fragmentary tale from the German literary scene (Part I)

 It's a strange feeling to witness the publication of certain German literary works in Britain fifteen or more years after they appeared on the German market. A strange feeling - at least for me, living in Germany until 2015. Living in Germany, writing in German, trying to get a foot in the door, the entrance door into the literary establishment. Or at least to be published, to find a publisher that shares or understands my literary concept, a concept that, I believed, had a certain appeal to the market as it presented itself around the mid-00s. In retrospect I'm glad that my two novels (2005-06) weren't published, not taken in account the money a potential bestseller would have brought me. The novels were typical for a person in their early thirties, a time when you feel the need to systematize your experiences so far, to tell others about them, to use them as a starting point to create a work of art, if you happen to be an artist. On the way, naturally, you are looking fo...
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