Book Review: "Selected Poems" by Paul Celan

This was a poetry anthology I had found by reading the book Around the World in 80 Books by David Damrosch. It is a fascinating book and when it first led me to this poetry collection I have to admit that I was cynical. When it comes to poetry, I am incredibly picky. I am far more pickier about my poetry than I am about my novels. I tend to read 18th and 19th century poetry more than anything else so the 20th century poem is something I have only read a bit of. Whilst I was reading Damrosch's description of Paul Celan's poetry, I was becoming more and more enticed by it. I decided to do a bit of digging into who Paul Celan was and it turns out that the life of this man would probably produce some very dark poetry indeed. From losing his parents to living through the second world war having hidden his Jewish identity the best he could all the way down to finally, at the age of just 49, drowning himself in a river - Paul Celan is a fascinating yet tragic character. Every ounce of his being is reflected by the images his poetry produces.

One thing I gathered from Paul Celan's poetry is that there is a theme of disappearing, or the act of getting smaller into nothing. I don't want to assume what this represents, but in cases that I have read about him - most of his poetry centres on his emotional state after the deaths of his parents. Take a look at these lines for the theme on disappearing (the / symbolises a new line):

But now the place shrinks, where you stand:/Where now, shadow-stripped, where?/Climb. Grope upwards./Thinner you grow, less knowable, finer!/Finer: a thread/The star wants to descend on:/So as to swim down beliow, down here/Where it sees itself shimmer:in the swell/Of wandering words.

Celan definitely seems to take issue with existence, showing how we can be reduced to nothing in the case of tragedy or difficulty. The very fact that this could reflect his own emotional and psychological states makes me upset to figure what he was thinking for most of his life.

Another theme I found was used a lot was the loss of identity or the loss of self. There are many phrases in the poems of Paul Celan that suggest that someone has either lost themselves, or has given up themselves to something else. Either way, this is a loss of identity which leaves the person empty either literally or metaphorically. Phrases such as:

• 'climb out of yourself forever'
• 'to stand for no-one and nothing'
• ' a strange lostness was palpably present'
• 'you I could hold when all fell away from me'

It is strange to think that the themes of disappearing and loss of identity would have been the two themes I had found first and foremost. Perhaps, I think I was influenced by reading about Paul Celan's life before I had actually read the book. I would like to think what would I have found if I had done those actions the other way around and read the book first and then looked him up. I may have found themes to be more positive such as the theme of rebirth and the theme of the weather. Two themes which also appear a lot in Celan's poetry.

In conclusion, I really enjoyed this text and because of that, I would definitely be interested in reading more poetry like this. Had I heard of the name Paul Celan before? Yes I had. Did I know what he did or who he was? No I didn't. But, I guess we learn something new every day.